Milestones

If you're waiting on exciting reports on getting settled back in our house, you're out of luck. I mean, we are pretty settled, and I'll blog about that soon. But today is devoted to my kids. We've had some big milestones in the house recently, despite having our stuff all over Ashland County. I could tell you about Cooper almost stabbing Abby in the eye with a fork, or about Abby asking how we could “fly to Jesus” (thank you Chris Rice) without having wings, or about Cooper being terrible when I take him to a restaurant but people telling me what an angel he is when they do, or about Abby trying to share some of Phil McKinney’s children’s church insanity to our calm, mellow church here.

I won’t. Here are some that have been really awesome to watch:

Abigail

To be honest (and I've told him this) I wasn't thrilled when Chris decided - without asking - to take Abby's training wheels off of her Dora bike to teach her how to ride without them. For one thing, Jimmy was in Pennsylvania, meaning he couldn't be a part of the experience. Besides, I didn't really think she was ready. Silly me. Within a few days of practicing without the extra wheels, she's doing an awesome job. She looks so big when she's riding ... and funny, she usually has her mouth wide open like she's silently screaming. She did something else this week that made us see just how big she’s getting. If you know Abby, you know her pink blanket. The beautiful crocheted blanket made by Kate, the lady who lived beside us when Abby was born, and who lives beside us again. For more than four and a half years, that blanket has been snuggled and pulled on, and although we’ve limited when it could leave the house, it’s still falling apart. While my mom was here, Abby asked her Nana to fix it. We explained to her that we could try to fix it, but that because of how it’s made, it’ll only fall apart again with time. She agreed to putting the blanket, and some other precious momentos from her babyhood into a shadowbox. Last night when I checked on her before I went to bed, it made me a little sad to see her sound asleep, but no pink blankie in sight.

Cooper

I was nervous about having our second child. Second children – generally – do everything later than first borns, and boys – generally – do many things later than girls. Abby talked early, walked early, got teeth early and did … well just about everything else “early.” I was afraid Cooper would seem like an idiot.

So far, he’s only behind on one thing: getting teeth. Most babies have twelve teeth by 19 months. Cooper had six. However, since his 19 month birthday (June 29) has fixed all that. He got one molar about two weeks ago. Early last week we noticed swelling and the beginning of white spots in three other spots. They’re all out now. In fact, one day while my mom was here, we left Mansfield only being able to see one of the teeth, you still couldn’t feel it. By the time we got to Ashland (about 20 min.) it had pushed through the gum. He was miserable. So were we.

The delay in teeth hasn’t delayed his talking, however. People are constantly amazed at how much he can say for a child his age. He’ll repeat just about anything you ask him to say (and some things you don’t.) He loves to say, “Thank you - bye, bye!” and “Boofball!” (translated: goofball) He loves “ho-sies” (translated: horsies) and “choo-choo chain” (translated: choo-choo train.)