Mozelle Parker Wallace 02/36/1929 – 02/04/2010

I think when I last posted, my grandmother was sick, but we were hoping she would make a recovery. She suffered from COPD, and was on oxygen at home. She came down with pneumonia, and ended up in the hospital. At first it looked really bad, but then she started doing better, and then things changed again and she went down hill. She asked not to be intubated, and signed a DNR as well. A few days later, the hospital said they had done all they could, and transferred her to a hospice facility.

My brother, his wife, and I drove down after work on Monday. We got there about 4:30 the next morning and Maw was still with us. She wasn’t very responsive… couldn’t open her eyes or talk. She was sleeping when we came in, but later did react a little when we spoke to her a little later. The day was uneventful, and that night we stayed with her overnight (Matt, Lauren, Sonya and myself). The rule was that two people had to be with her at all times. She was on oxygen and morphine only… no monitors, no IV fluids, etc. Continue reading

Snow Day!

The snow came in a little earlier than expected. Most businesses closed up early as did Mallory and Calen’s school. So we picked them up and brought them home and enjoyed the view. My grandmother went into the hospital with strep pnuemonia, which hasn’t been good. News from Hickory has been better since yesterday morning, which is a blessing. Please keep her in your prayers as she hopefully recovers. The weather being what it is, I can’t make it there to be with the family, which is discouraging.

Maw and the kids at Christmas in Hickory.

Maw and the kids at Christmas in Hickory.

That being said, we made the best of it and had some good friends over for dinner and games. It took Mallory a few minutes to warm up, but as you’ll see in the video, she did indeed warm up. Continue reading

Where’s Heaven?

So I’ve started praying with Mallory at night before she goes to bed. Usually our bedtime ritual is bath, pj’s, a book and then she crawls in bed and I sing “You Are My Sunshine” to her a couple times. Sometimes she sings with me, some times she just listens. The other night though I started praying with her… mainly with me praying and her just repeating. Last night though, when I asked her if she wanted me to sing “Sunshine” she said, “no”, that she wanted to “pray to Jesus”. Talk about grabbing at a dad’s heart.

So we prayed, and when she’s praying I normally just close with “I love you Jesus, Amen”. Well last night became a question and answer…

Her: Where is Jesus?
Me: Jesus is in heaven with God
Her: In heaven with God?
Me: Yes
Her: Where is heaven?
Me: hmmm… heaven is way up in the sky (best I could do on short notice)
Her: I want to go to heaven and see Jesus
Me: (thinking…) Do you love Jesus?
Her: Yes
Me: Then one day you will get to go to heaven and see Jesus
Her: Ok. Do you love Jesus Daddy?
Me: Yes, I love Jesus
Her: You get to go to heaven and see Jesus?
Me: Yes, I do, we both get to go
Her: Do you love God?
Me: Yes, I love God too.
Her: Do you love heaven?
Me: Yes, I love heaven too.
Her: Does Mommy love Jesus
Me: Yes, Mommy loves Jesus
Her: Does Mommy love God?
Me: Yes, Mommy loves God
Her: Does Mommy love Heaven?
Me: Yes, Mommy loves Heaven
Her: Does Calen love Jesus?
Me: Yes, Calen loves Jesus too
Her: Ok. Sing “sunshine” daddy
Me: Ok baby, You are my sunshine . . .

Visiting Santa and Big Girl Panties

I have to admit that I was heading into today with a pretty pessimistic attitude. Mallory’s teachers have been having a lot of good luck with her using the potty at school. Some days she’ll go without having to change her pull-up at all. The only problem is that the same level of excitment about using the potty doesn’t seem to follow her home. On Friday, her teacher finally said those magic words. . . “We are ready for big girl panties.”

Could it be true? Could we be on the verge of saving $120,000/year in diapers? I left school excited, however over the weekend, Mallory did not volunteer or cooperate with going to the potty once. Nada. Zilch. So I was a little less than excited about giving it a try today. My fear was only reinforced when Mallory exclaimed to me about 1/2 mile from her school that she had “pee peed in her panties”. Sure enough, her pants were wet, so I took her into school first thing wet. Her teacher was nice enough to take it from there.

I wondered a few times throughout the day how well she would do. I truly expected to come to school and find her back in pull-ups. When I arrived, a teacher (not her normal teacher) told me that she had a small accident and she changed her pants. But to my surprise, she was still wearing panties. This mean that she had only had one accident at school that day… what a BIG GIRL. Continue reading

PeePee in the Potty and Calen’s 2-Month Checkup

Mallory has moved up into a new class both at daycare and at church. She’s getting to be such a big girl, and she says some of the funniest things. I guess more accurately, they are funny because she is putting thoughts together on her own. She’s been telling me on the way to school in the morning to “Drive faster daddy… so the policeman will get behind you.” This morning she was saying “wow, that’s a big cloud way up in the sky”.

Her teachers say she is doing great. I think she was ready for the challenge and would prefer her to have some kids to look up to. The biggest benefit has been the peer pressure on going potty. I believe today is the first day that she has not had an accident at school… meaning that she went to the potty every time. We need to find a way to get the same response at home. They don’t think it will be too long before she is ready for some “big girl panties.” I think that will be the act that seals the deal, since it won’t be comfortable at all, and will probably be embarrassing to use the bathroom in her panties.

Calen went to Dr Leeper for his 2 month appointment today. He is just above 50% in all of his measures (head size, height, weight). He weighed 12 lbs and 2 oz. Dr. Leeper said he was looking great and that what we thought was cradle cap, or infant acne, was actually something where his body is replacing skin cells faster than it needs to. I can’t remember what it was called, but dandruff shampoo is supposed to help. Calen got 3 shots and the roto-virus vaccine today. He wasn’t too happy about the whole thing and turned a shade of red that I don’t believe I had seen before. Only a couple minutes though and he was calmed back down. Continue reading

Week 8

Well, we’ve made it to the 8th week. It’s funny what you forget. Like, I can’t remember how old Mallory was before I got enough sleep to feel human again. My mom seems to think Mallory was easy, but I remember having to put her in the “sleeper hold” on occasion. At any rate, Calen is a pill. His fussy time is at night. It varies between just after the 8:00 feeding and the 11:00 feeding. I prefer the nights where he is fussy after the 8:00 feeding (like tonight). And after a week of a full house, he has decided that he is a lap baby. (great) Now, not only does he not want to sleep at night, he also doesn’t want to sleep during the day. . . unless he’s being held. ugh I’m working on him.
Saturday night, he kept me up until about 2:30, but then he slept until 7:30. Last night, I fed him at 10:30, and he slept until 5:30. Unfortunately, I woke up every 2 hours checking on him. We are hoping the extended sleep is a trend. . . and my anxiety is not.
Other than that, things are pretty much as you would expect with a newborn. We’re tired. But now that he is starting to open his eyes and smile and coo, he’s irresistible. I can’t wait to see what his little personality is like. I look at Mallory and see that it goes so fast. I have to say that the first milestone I look forward to is him being able to hold his own bottle. Wow the freedom!
Kylie is doing well at school. . . we think. It depends on the day. All we can pray for is that she does well enough to keep her scholarships. I do think she is getting a lot of life lessons though. The first year of college is all about figuring things out anyway, right?
Then, of course, there’s Mallory. I wish we carried around a video recorder with us at all times. Some of the things she comes up with are hysterical. We were coming home one Sunday and were discussing taking a nap. She said, “We get in mommy/daddy’s bed and watch Mickey Mouse. . . how bout dat?” What a little negotiator. By the way, we’ve tried that before thinking that we could sleep while she watched tv, it doesn’t work. The last time we tried she told Johnathan to turn it up because she couldn’t hear. He did without saying a word, and we heard a little voice say, “tick you”. She surprised my mom over the weekend. They were up in the bonus room and the sunlight was disappearing. She said, “It dark in here. Turn on lights.” Mom did and Mallory said, “Dat’s much better.” But, the latest was Monday morning. Normally, if she doesn’t get a bath at night, she takes a shower with daddy in the morning. Well, Johnathan asked me if I thought she needed to take a shower since she didn’t really do anything on Sunday. She said, “No. . . I just take a baff tonight.” I’ll try to keep track of more. There are just too many to remember.
She is moving up to the next class as school. The teacher says that she is more mature than some others that have already moved up. Her biggest obstacle is using the “big girl potty”. She is resistant. She says she wants to, but she just doesn’t do it. Over Thanksgiving, we tried something that was suggested by her teacher. We set a timer, and every time it went off, we took her to the potty. Well, the little snot started using the bathroom in her diaper when the timer went off. We even tried putting on “big girl panties” (training pants. . . wait till you see that video). She had an accident. She cried because she had pee’d on the floor. We tried that a couple more times, but she started refusing to go sit on the potty. By Saturday afternoon, I had given up. I know that she can do it. She is just being stubborn. I figure that once she is in this new class full-time, peer pressure will get to her, and she will want to potty train. Then, maybe we’ll get somewhere. But I will say that she pooped in the potty for the first time tonight. That was an experience. Very exciting! I’ll keep you posted.

1 Month Old

I have so much to talk about, and if my youngest child wasn’t screaming his head off right now, I might actually be inclined to blog about it. Calen has decided to fuss from about 10:00 pm until 12:30 or 1:00 (it’s 10:05 now). Why that time? Why not early evening like all other babies? Who knows. But it’s quite exhausting.
I did manage to upload some more pics today (you’re welcome, mom). In the family category, there are some in Calen – 0 Months, Calen – 1 Month, Mallory – 2 Years Old and a couple in Kylie (she’s not around much anymore). In the Events category, there are Halloween 2009 and Mallory’s First Dentist Visit (that was actually fun).
If I get some time over the weekend, I’ll catch everyone up. Enjoy the pics.

11 Days Old

While Johnathan and I were engaged, we talked about our future a lot, which of course included how many kids we wanted. He said he wanted 12. My response was, “You better find someone else to marry.” :) He said it so much that when we took the initial “test” for our pre-marital counseling, he was worried that I wouldn’t be able to accurately answer the question of how many kids my fiance wanted. I tell you this story because our first night at home, he looked at me and said, “Honey, I’ve changed my mind. Two is enough.” :) I have always said that man-to-man defense is the best.

In the hospital, Mallory was all about holding Calen. And the way she holds her hands out and cups them for you to put him in her arms is the cutest thing you have ever seen. But when we would take him and give him to someone else, she would get big tears in her eyes and say, “I want my baby back!” It was so sad and cute at the same time. We had no idea what to expect when we got home. It was one thing to deal with the baby brother in the hospital – a neutral location, but what would it be like when the baby came home with us? A couple of weeks before the birth, I bought Mallory a big sister gift. It included a baby doll, a high chair, a cradle and a stroller (her favorite piece). So when we came in from the hospital, the first thing we did was pile up in the bed and let her hold Calen for a few minutes. Then, I went to get the gift. Her attention quickly turned from baby brother to her new baby. Daddy and MeeMaw put it together…with some “help” from Mallory. She was so excited. Continue reading