Trying Out Single Parenthood

Don't worry! John and I are still as happy together as ever. But last week Katie didn't see us together for four days and John and I each had a chance to play "single parent" for awhile. Of course, the three of us would rather be together all the time! But I had to share the many adventures of last week.

Time With Daddy

On Sunday, Sept. 7, we all went to Baltimore to celebrate John's brother Jamie's birthday. The next day John had a doctor's appointment there, and I had a meeting closer to home, so we decided to have Katie and Bella stay with John and his parents in Baltimore while I went home and spent my first night without Katie. Boy did I miss everyone! And then they decided to stay in B-more through Monday dinner, while I had plans that night, so I didn't even get to see Katie before she went to bed that night. Sniff, sniff...

However, there was an unexpected blessing: I'd been trying to wean Katie but wasn't quite done yet. However, Katie and I were separated for 36 hours, so the weaning took care of itself! It was SO much easier than I had anticipated! So I thank God (and John and his parents) for that!

Time With Mommy

By the time Katie woke up Tuesday morning (and BOY was I happy to see her after my period of KatieWithdrawal!), John had left for 3 days of work travel. We both missed him very much. However, we had lots of adventures while he was gone.

Tuesday morning Katie and I had our first week of Community Bible Study (CBS) for the year. This year I'm a co-core leader for a group of moms with young children, and I'm really enjoying getting to know a bunch of new friends. Afterwards I had a leadership lunch, and although Katie was super tired, she perked right up when the plates of spaghetti and french fries showed up. In a later post, I'll show you what she looks like eating spaghetti. She doesn't tend to eat much usually, but when it comes to spaghetti, she usually eats till it starts coming back up! Anyway, her spaghetti-eating entertained the whole table of leaders.

Tuesday evening we hosted my former roommate, Jaime, who was here from Arizona on business, along with another couple (aka the parents of 11-month-old Kai, Katie's betrothed). Leave it to me to only take photos of the babies instead of the adults. Kai and Katie had a great time playing, especially in the ball pool:

But the real adventure began after Kai and his parents left. Jaime and I took Katie and Bella for a late-night walk since Daddy wasn't in town to do Bella's last walk of the day. And when we got home, Katie was missing her glasses!! Oh no!!! So Jaime and I spent an hour or so of our quality time together scouring the neighborhood with mediocre flashlights, trying to find the glasses. No luck (at least that night). But thanks anyway, Jaime!

After dropping Jaime off, I went home and baked a birthday cake for my best friend Sara, since I was having her and some friends over the next morning for playgroup. At 12:15 am I took the cake out of the oven, left it out to cool, and collapsed exhausted into bed.

Wednesday morning I awoke early with Katie. We took Bella on another walk along the same path we'd lost the glasses, but even in the daylight we couldn't find them. Sigh.

When we came back, I took a look at my poor birthday cake. There were 200 ants crawling all over it!! ACK!! I shook them off and did some quick panicked thinking. Could I still serve the cake, and just not tell anyone about the ants? Tempting, but no. Maybe stick a candle in it and tell Sara it's the thought that counts, even if she can't eat the cake? But what kind of best friend would I be then? Finally I decided I had no choice but to bake her another cake. So I did, and Sara was so blessed. It was worth it if it blessed her.

Before Sara came over though, I took a shower. Since Katie was awake, she had to hang out in the bathroom with me (usually I shower when she's sleeping, but she'd woken up earlier than usual that day). When Katie started fussing outside the shower door, I cracked the door so she could peek in and talk to me. But she pushed the shower door all the way open and climbed in with me, pajamas and all. Although she HATES it when I try to give her a shower, apparently it's totally fun when it's done on her terms. She ran around inside the shower with me, and I even got to shave my legs because she was having so much fun. Of course, she was drenched!

We had a great time that day with Sara and our friends. As our time together came to a close, I printed off ten flyers and my friends Sara and Kim walked around the neighborhood with me to help look for the glasses and to post flyers everywhere:

After we had posted all but one of the flyers and we were two houses from the end of the route, Kim found the glasses!! HOORAY FOR KIM! Someone had picked the glasses up and put them on a branch, and since I had been focused on the ground (where Katie would have thrown them), I never would have seen them there. I am so thankful to God and to Kim. Even worse than being out $300 for the glasses would have been having to be without glasses for Katie for several weeks till we could get a replacement pair. After all the progress her eyes have made, I really don't want to take any steps backward if possible. So, thank You Lord!!

(Incidentally, Katie came across the stack of flyers in the recycling pile tonight -- usually she has no interest in that pile but tonight she started laughing hysterically as she flipped through the pages, squealing, "Whoozdat?!! Whoozdat?!!" with each new photo of her. Of course, she knows exactly who that is!)

Wednesday evening I got to go to a fancy dinner that my client invited me to. They had bought a table there, and I had a wonderful time with my coworkers, with my brother Stephen (who is interning there this fall) and his fiancee Lindsey, and with several old colleagues that I got to see there. And I'm super-thankful to my "baby" brother Daniel (age 23) who stepped out of his comfort zone to watch a toddler that night so I could go. Thank you, Daniel!

Thursday we had my friend Abbie over with her 5 1/2-month-old Meghan. Katie loves Meghan and it's so funny to see them love on each other and play with each other's toys.

While we were still playing with Abbie and Meghan, Daddy came home! And it was one happy family reunion!

Reflections In Her Glasses

What a blessed two days since Katie first got her glasses. Two things I'm praising God for tonight:

1. That Katie is NOT fighting me AT ALL with her glasses. So far she is wearing them contentedly at all times. The only time she takes them off is in the car, but I think it's more out of boredom and to have something to chew on than it is because they're bothering her.

2. Instead of being annoyed by strangers' questions, I'm finding that they are now a chance to tell people about how good God has been to us.

Let me explain. Up till now, the questions have been about why she had to wear a patch -- something like, "Awww! What happened to her EYE?" Such well-intentioned questions were unfortunately usually thrown at me while we were in a rush, and there really is no quick answer. “She had JXG and now has lingering vision issues” begs the question, “What is JXG?” And unless I was standing in line or otherwise chilling out somewhere, I really didn’t want to get into the long story for someone who wouldn’t understand what I was saying and who wouldn’t care five minutes later anyway. I’ve been happy to explain the story to people who love Katie and who will pray for her (in fact, I should probably post the long story on the blog for those of you who still want more background). However, I quickly tired of investing time and breath to merely satisfy others’ fleeting curiosity. I actually found it easiest when a child asked me about the patch, because I could keep the answer super-simple and avoid any second questions: “The baby has to wear a band-aid on her eye because her eye is hurt.” That has satisfied almost every kid we’ve run into.

And since questions about Katie’s patch have been constant when she’s worn it in public, I have tried hard to do her patch time only at home or with close friends and family. However, Katie now has to wear her glasses every waking moment. So unless we’re going to turn into hermits (yeah, like THAT’s going to happen with us super-extroverts!), that means Katie’s eye issues can’t be hidden from public scrutiny anymore. And you know what? It’s actually been very cool! Because now that Katie is wearing glasses, the question from strangers is no longer, “Awww, what’s wrong?” but rather an incredulous (and sometimes jealous), “How did you know something was wrong with her vision at such a young age?” And yes, the story is still a bit long, but it’s a HAPPY story and one in which I can give God all the glory for His mercy and goodness to us. It really is a MIRACLE that we found Katie’s eye issues at 5 weeks old, and that we have been under the care of the best infantile glaucoma expert ever since then. And I have been able to testify to my God’s goodness over and over again this week.

Here are a few more photos of my bespectacled baby:

This is Katie with my good friend Amy, who got her Masters in Social Work today after MANY years of hard work and while raising two kids and working as well. I admire Amy so much! Congratulations, Amy!

Amy handed her daughters' swimsuit down to Katie, and guess what? It's the exact same five colors as her glasses!

And just in case you had any doubt that Katie's mommy was raising her to be a Broadway Baby, check out the onesie that Mommy brought back for Katie the last time we were in NYC:

The Bespectacled Baby

Well, the day has finally come. Ten months after a team of great doctors miraculously discovered our five-week-old child's vision problem, Katie is old enough for glasses.

I had been both looking forward to and dreading this day. I was looking forward to being able to work toward FIXING her problem, rather than just keeping it from getting worse by using eyepatches. But I also knew that keeping glasses on a girl who's less than a year old would be a 24/7 battle.

And at first it was a battle. Especially in the eyeglasses store. (incidentally, email me if you want a recommendation of a GREAT glasses store) So I took the glasses off, got her home, and put her down for a nap, hoping a bit of rest would make her more docile during the next battle.

Daddy was home by the time she woke up, and he was great in helping me to distract her in her highchair while we started the next battle. And you know what? Within 2 minutes she stopped the constant fighting. A minute or two later, as I took a few photos, she even gave me a smile or two. And a few minutes later she stopped fighting altogether. In fact, she only reached for her glasses a few more times over the next few hours. Only when she started getting sleepy did she start grabbing at the glasses again.

I'm constantly humbled and amazed by God's mercy to me. You'd think after 20-odd years of following Him, I would know better than to worry about such things. He always takes care of me, whether His Will lines up with mine or not. And I'm truly grateful.

So is Katie seeing better now? Hard to tell after just a few hours with a barely verbal bespectacled baby, but I did notice a few things tonight. I found her examining her wiggling fingers as if she was seeing them for the first time. And when I took the glasses off just before putting her in her crib, she looked at her fingers again, as if to notice the difference. Also, when I turned on the end of American Idol, she seemed to be able to see the TV better than she could before.

Thank you all for your prayers and care for us.

A Day in the Life: Eyes, Goodbyes, Kai, Hi, A.I., and New Things to Try

Yesterday was a long, busy day in Katie World. We started the day off with her eye doctor, and got news I wasn't quite ready for yet: She needs glasses immediately. I knew the day would come, but 11 1/2 months seems awfully young to be wearing glasses. I have to admit I struggled a bit through the day as the news settled in. So I spent a few hours last night on the site "Babies With Glasses" and was comforted to read stories from other moms in similar situations. Of particular interest to me was the photo gallery of babies with glasses. It was hard for me to imagine until then what exactly a baby with glasses would look like. We'll be getting the glasses later this week and I'll post a photo then.

Until then, here are some fun photos of Katie enjoying the tiny couch in the doctor's waiting room.

Afterwards we caught the last 15 minutes of Mommy's last Bible study of the year. Community Bible Study has been such a blessing to me this year. Katie and I have been in a "small" group of 23 nursing moms and their babies. When we started, Katie was 3 1/2 months old and would sit quietly in her car seat while we had our discussion about Genesis. Those days are ancient history!! Now she climbs all over the other babies and their toys. It's been fun to see all the babies grow up this year. So it's sad to say our goodbyes.

We went home for a few hours of "quiet" time (Katie napping, playing, eating, and getting her patch time in; Mommy watching her, working and doing laundry; both of us walking the dog), and then Katie's good friend (aka potential husband) Kai came over with his mommy. I didn't get any good photos of them together yesterday, but here's one of them playing together last week:

Daddy came home shortly after Kai left, and Katie got to try two new things: grown-up lasagna and her new walking toy. She couldn't get enough of the lasagna, and neither could her clothes. Needless to say, we carried her straight to the bathtub after dinner was over.

Then we pulled out her new walking toy, a hand-me-down from my friend Betsy (thank you, Betsy!). In no time flat, she was running across the living room with it. Here's the video.

After cheering her on, John stepped outside to finish mowing the lawn (can I tell you again how much I LOVE having John home before sunset?!!). I took Katie over to watch, and Katie enjoyed waving HI! to her Daddy. See video below.

Finally we started settling down for the night, but not until we enjoyed our favorite Tuesday night family pasttime: American Idol (A.I.). John and I are cheering for David Cook, but Katie enjoys cheering for everyone. She has always been fascinated by American Idol -- see this former blog post and this video taken last week:

Katie was more than ready for bed by her 9 pm bedtime!