Forks and Closed Mouth Kisses

Jace used his fork properly for the first time all on his own tonight!

He had Mac-n-cheese, Gerber Graduate Meat Sticks and left over sausage for dinner. He actually got some of the mac-n-cheese on his fork and ate it right off it! However, he quickly decided that it was much quicker and easier to just use his hands!

I was so proud of him and let him know that too.....he probably was thinking "mom - you are nuts getting excited over something so silly!!" That's what mommies do right?

Before bed, Justin was holding Jace and  I leaned in to give him a kiss. This is something that is hit or miss with him. Well tonight he decided he wanted to give me a kiss and proceeded to with his mouth closed, lips puckered and even made the kiss sound "MUAH!"

Oh it was so cute and heart melting! :)

Today I decided to listen to a CD Justin and I received when Family Life came to the bible study at work when I was big and pregnant. It was a story about a family that lost their first baby, a little girl, after just 7 days of life so I decided to put off listening to this story until after Jace was born. The CD came across my mind today and felt very compelled to listen to it finally.

All I can really say about it is WOW! Even if you have not lost a child this story still helps you to remember that God is with us in all of our battles. He can and will step in as He sees necessary to glorify His kingdom!

I was taken by surprise thinking this baby girl was born with heart issues or was expected to have issues but she wasn't. She was expected to be perfectly normal but after birth they found she had brain damage that would require extensive brain surgeries she would likely not survive through. This really hit home! I could relate with this family and its comforting to hear their faith grow through their journey as well. Obviously Jace's actual life doesn't depend on surgery but his quality of life does. I know what kind of thought process the parents went through thinking about the decision of brain surgery. This family inspired me to continue to let go and place my battles, all of them - big or small, in God's hands. I am reminded that we all have purpose in life and we will all leave a legacy. Our legacy should include worshipping and glorifying God's Kingdom. Even though our lives can have incredible struggles on this Earth we will one day be in the arms of Jesus. His timing is perfect and though we do not know WHY we go through what we do and when we do this is a great purpose He has in this all. I have come to realize in the the past years reflecting back on all the hardships and good times I have encountered to see the bigger picture. I still have questions about things but I know in my heart He has a path for my family and me.

If you want to hear this CD, it can be purchased here.

We are headed back to Lexington this weekend and get to spend time with family and friend there. Jace is really starting to enjoy the country! I love that he gets to experience both the city and the country. I know he is going to love Lexington as much as Justin and I do.

Something To Talk About

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Jace has something to talk about!

He has really been picking up words and actions.

Some new and some not so new. I love watching him hit milestones and do new things. Here are some recent things he has done:

He says "more" and then it sounds like he says "all done" and "please" (of course the last two with signs too)

When we ask Jace what a cow says he says "mmmmmoooo" :)

He picked this up WAY quicker than I thought he would and loves to see cows in Lexington or wherever else we happen to pass by cows.

Last time we went to Lexington JB was making the car shake from side to side and Jace LOVED it. He started to swing his head from side to side in the car seat and when we ask him to dance he does this as well. The only problem is some of the swinging looks like he is BANGING his head into his car seat - OUCH!

We play peek a boo a lot but recently Jace has started the SLOW peek a boo! :) He is too cute!

One of his favorite toys lately has been his cars. When we play with the cars we say "Vroom" and push it around. He picked up on this so quickly and I think he looks so cute crawling on the floor playing cars.

This video isn't the best....he plays more with them on carpet. I could imagine the hard floors hurt his knees after a bit.

Today I put his backpack on him and he walked around with it for a while. I NEED to get him a backpack with his name on it. He likes his backpack just like Dora has. :)

This past week we received Jace's Song of Love written just for him. Its very cute. Once I can figure out how to convert the sound file into a video without actually applying it to pictures I will post it, along with the lyrics. Songs of Love is a GREAT program. You can go to this website (Songs of Love) to find out more information on it. They operate on donations, so if you have the ability to donate I encourage it!

We also received the medicine we ordered from Canada. I was surprised at how quickly we got it in. I am starting to wonder if there is something different between the powder packets to the pills. And then if there is a difference between the pills made by Sandoz and those made by Lundbeck. The days Jace has taken pills crushed up he has less seizures.....this could be coincidence or GREAT news that we seemed to have stumbled upon! We will be sending back pills to replenish the Fielder's stock from what they loaned us. As I have said before there are reasons for everything and God has a path laid out for us. Even after all of this mess with insurance deductibles and co pays, I see more blessings we have gotten out of this ordeal than hassle. If we truly are seeing that Jace is having less seizures when using the pills rather than the pocket satchels then that alone is a blessing. So far today Jace has not had any seizures we have seen. I still have a few more powder satchels and I will see after a few says of using the pills if his seizures are at bay. Then I will test out the powder satchels later this week. How great would that be!! If we can control his seizures with the pills until he can have surgery...God is GREAT!

Monkeying Around and Bouncing Right on into 2011

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Right before 2010 ended Jace became a little monkey :)

Here are some cute clips of him climbing.

New Years came and went as quickly as Christmas did.....and it left me with a question -

Where did 2010 go?

Wow that year FLEW by!!

 On New Years Eve, Jace and I went to the Schumpert's house for Trey's 3rd birthday party. They had a bounce house there on top of all the other toys they normally have out there.  

I put Jace in the bounce house with a few of the other kids and he was baffled at first. After watching the other kids (most were older - almost 3) he realized what he needed to do and started to bounce a little bit. He had a blast with all the kids there. We love visiting Trey and Keely when we go to Lexington. Trey is so easy with Jace and Keely is about Jace's age so they get along well playing.

Here are some pictures and videos of the bounce house and tunnel at the party

Jace loves to climb all over Papa's wheelchair. He was climbing on it and talking to Papa so much this past weekend!

Papa always makes sure there is Bluebell in the freezer when his boys come to visit. Jace finally tried some and check out this response! Typical Bryan boy for sure!

He was asking for "More?" and signing "Please"

Trying to teach those manners early! :)

Jace has really been doing well with his speech and I am so excited about this. The more and more I listen to him I can hear actual words like "More", "Lil Bit", "Door", and so on.....they are here and there but I LOVE to hear this considering I have been so concerned with his speech.

The carrier I rented came in. I originally was going to try the Ergo Baby but was recommended to try the Beco Butterfly 2. I actually loved it and I think Jace did as well. It was so easy to get him on and off of me without assistance. Also, I never once felt like I was toting around 28 lbs on me.

Checking out the carrier before we headed out to try it

Mommy and Jace both liked the Beco

We had off on Monday the 3rd so we took advantage of it and brought Jace to a partial day at daycare since it had been so long since he has been there. He did well and was EXHAUSTED after that day!

He could barely keep his eyes open on the way home

Today was his 2nd day back and it went much better than yesterday. He ate his lunch and took a long nap with all of his friends at school. I think he is enjoying going to "school" right now and I hope that continues.

Tonight I put him in the bath and let him use his bath crayons to draw on the tub. I am convinced that he is a lefty! Here he is drawing on the bath tub with his crayons. BTW - these crayons are awesome! So easy to clean off the tub and they color even when wet!



Firsts and Seconds

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This weekend was BUSY!

Lets talk about a First.....Jace's First Haircut on Saturday!
With Jace's extended EEG coming up I knew we HAD to do something with Jace's hair. It had gotten so long and getting glue out of it would be such an endless task.

We were choosing between Cool Cuts for Kids or Pigtails and Crewcuts.

Well after calling both places we decided to go with the one with the most professional sounding staff - Pigtails and Crewcuts. After all they were going to be in charge of cutting Jace's hair without scaring him.

I have to rave about Pigstails and Crewcuts! They did incredible with Jace. He didn't shed one tear!

I am pretty sure that the main factor that kept Jace content was the DumDum lollipop I brought for him.

We took many pictures and some video which I compiled together. Enjoy!

I can see the Fingerprints of God

He doesn't look like a baby anymore :(

After getting his haircut it was lunch time at Chick-fil-a! YUM!

Jace loves eating there as much as we do.

And he should I ate it ALL the time when I was pregnant with him!

And for the seconds.....After lunch it was time for Jace to go see Santa for this year!

It was surprising that there wasn't a long line to see Santa like last year. At Bass Pro Shop they offer a free 4x6 picture with Santa. How much better could you get than free?!

Jace again didn't shed a tear - he did look at Santa like "Who in the world are you?" :)

It was time to go home after seeing Santa........but first a piggy back ride from daddy!

Classic plumber's crack

Another first - Jace eating off a plate like a big boy. My mom has been working with Jace eating off a plate or out of a bowl and its appears to be successful!

Lil Bit enjoys Jace at times and even tries to play with him. Here they are playing with Lil Bit's teddy bear.

Jace Finally Said Dada Again...

Friday night I got the opportunity to babysit little 4 month old Nathan.  Lisa and Josh needed an adult only date night. He was an ANGEL! I was able to go back and remember what Jace was like a year ago. It certainly was easy with Nathan partly because I had been there done that but also he is such an easy going little boy!



The handsome gentleman I spent my Friday night with!



Jace finally said Dada again!!! Praise the LORD!!!

Here is a short video clip of proof!

He seems to be doing very well this weekend with his episodes and with acting like any other 15/16 month old. It is so exciting to see that little boy shine through all that seizure darkness that goes on way too often.

I was playing with my video camera a lot on Saturday. Here are some more video clips I caught of Jace.

Jace playing with Lil Bit - She is starting to be more and more tolerant of toddlers. Good thing because she has her hands full with Jace in the house!

We are also having to watch Jace much closer these days because he is so close to really climbing....Thankfully he has not started climbing out of his crib just yet!

And along with climbing he is *THIS* close to actually running...he tries so hard. He really does but those little legs are just so short and don't seem to let him really get some speed behind them.

Jace's favorite bedtime story is Cuddle, a VERY cute book given to us by Diana. We read it every night and we have Jace point out the little boy. This night he decided the little boy needed kisses though :)

He is so sweet!

Today, Lisa and I went to the Nutcracker Market. We brought our little ones with us as well. I was questioning if we were nuts or just confident in our mothering. Who in their right minds would take a 4 month old and an almost 16 month old to the Nutcracker Market?

This "adventure" turned out better than we had expected and the boys did great!

We both had sleeping children despite having no strollers in the market. 

That was EASY! ;)

On the way home Nathan got a little upset and was crying....as you can see Jace didn't want to hear any of it. Lisa and I saw Jace covering his ears and we laughed SO hard about that. Eventually Jace covering his ears turned into him crying with Nathan. He must have thought " If you can't shut them up, then join them!"

Can someone please make him stop?!?!

 While at the Nutcracker Market I bought a plate that can be written on with dry erase marker. This plate/platter is to put Santa's cookies on every year. Since we can write on the platter Jace can write a letter to Santa on it and Santa can leave a note on it when he visits.

Cute plate for Santa's cookies

Month One

WOW! What a journey so far and it's ONLY just begun!

One month FLEW by and was full of new and exciting things!

I was able to get out and do a mommy thing by myself. I went to lunch at Chick-fil-a and then to get my hair highlighted and trimmed. As soon as I made it to Katy I was missing Jace BIG TIME! Its so funny how you think you want to get out alone but once you do you are consumed by the urge to just be home with your child! Justin did great taking care of Jace while I was out but I was so happy to get back home to both of my boys! :)

I have been putting Jace on his belly to sleep for naps since that is the only time he will let me do "tummy time". If he is awake he HATES it! I kept thinking he would never learn to pick his head up while on his tummy because we never get to practice it.

Jace smiled at Justin and I for the first time on the 16th of August.

It melts my heart! After he smiled that one time we were able to get him to smile many more times. Oh SO SWEET!!

Here is a picture I was able to catch of him smiling.


We went to the doctor, Jace was diagnosed with reflux and was put on Zantac to help. I PRAY it works because it is very difficult to get him to nurse due to it.
He is steadily growing - on the lower end of average but growing :)

Here is our first monthly picture - I will try to do this picture with the same set up every month for his first year to show the growth and changes he will go through!