Newsletter: April 2006 Archives

4-9-06

Another two months have passed and I don't know where the time is going. With two boys to keep me busy and James' work keeping him busy the time just seems to speed by.

First I'll give an update on Jacob. It's been so fun to have him in our family. He is such a good little boy. He is a little bit more demanding than Seth was as a baby, which means he actually lets me know when he wants his diaper changed or when he's hungry. Seth only cried if I put off his feeding for longer than I should have. Jacob has hit a few milestones in the last two months. We were rewarded with his first smile in March and he has begun giggling and laughing when he is truly content. I took him to his two month check up on the 21st of March and he was 10 lbs. 12 oz. and 21 and 1/2 inches long. The doctor was worried about the shape of his head since, before that time, he would only turn his head to the left side and he would sleep on that side too so his head was a little smooshed to one side. She had me go out and buy a sleep positioner which is made up of two triangular foam wedges that the baby sleeps between. I prop him up on one of the wedges so that his head is forced to turn to the right side. We noticed a difference in the shape of his head almost immediately. Now he is getting very good at holding his head up and moving it back and forth so I don't think we will have to do the therapy much longer. Just this weekend I gave him a little haircut (much to James' dismay). The piece of hair that goes down the middle of his forehead was so long that it was getting in his eyes, so I trimmed it up and also tidied up the hair that was hanging over his ears. His hair is still wild and out of control, but it looks a little neater now and you can see his face a little bit better.

Seth has been my big helper and busy boy lately. He is becoming so independent and very opinionated. He likes to choose what he will wear and is getting pretty good at putting on his clothes himself. When I have some sort of treat or really anything that he wants, he will tell me that he needs some and that he wants his OWN. He is learning his colors and gets them right most of the time. We got a DVD of some Blue's Clues episodes and they are about shapes and colors. I think they really helped him get interested in learning those things. There are a few pictures on the site that show him wearing a newspaper hat. That idea also came from Blue's Clues. We had a day where we had to make newspaper hats for everyone, even Jacob and Lion. Seth is also becoming obsessed with trains, he plays with the big train set we got him last year and talks about going through tunnels and pointing out every train he hears or sees. I love hearing him say "Chugga, chugga, choo, choo and All Aboard" in his little voice. This last week he has been quite clumsy and has bonked his head a bunch of times. One morning he was trying to take off his pajamas and tripped and fell. Since his arms were tied up in his pajamas he didn't have anything to catch himself with. He fell right on his face. I couldn't pick him up right away because I was just about to feed Jacob. When I was able to pick him up he went into convulsions. His eyes rolled back and his arms and legs were twitching. The convulsions only lasted 5 or 10 seconds, but it was enough to freak me out. Even though he seemed fine afterward, just a little sad and clingy, I called my mom and told her what happened. She told me I should take him to the pediatrician to make sure nothing was really wrong. We went over to the doctor's office and she said he looked fine but to keep an eye on him for a few days. I was relieved that there was nothing seriously wrong. It was scary for me though. Seth has been fine since, I think he is going through another growth spurt which is contributing to his clumsiness. I have one funny story to tell about Seth too. When he says his personal prayers at night he has been blessing Grandpa Lane in Iraq, but now that Lane is in Israel and John is in Iraq, we have been trying to get him to bless Grandpa in Israel and John in Iraq. Tonight, he blessed Grandpa in Iraq and James told him that Grandpa was in Israel. Seth was very positive that Grandpa was in Iraq, we tried to tell him that John was in Iraq now, but he insisted that Grandpa was. After a bit of discussion, James finally asked him where he thought John was. Seth looked up and said "John is on a airplane." I suppose it was a perfectly logical statement for him since the last time he saw John was when we dropped him off at the airport. So I guess John has been on an airplane for the past month or so. That's a LONG flight!

On the 21st of March we left for our trip to Disneyland. We had some bad weather on the drive there. We were north of Fillmore and a pickup truck that had just passed us slid off the road and rolled several times. I pulled over and James got out to see if he could help. Luckily the emergency crews responded very quickly. There was a man and his wife and their young baby in the truck. Apparently the baby had been ejected from the truck, but wasn't hurt. The father was able to get out and take care of the baby, but the mother was pinned in the truck. I hope that they were all okay. That is something that I never want to see again. I was extremely jumpy the rest of the drive that day. We spent the night just outside of Vegas and got to our hotel in Anaheim the next day.

The very first thing that we had to do at Disneyland was to ride the train around the park. Seth was enraptured and a little scared. He loved watching the conductors and hearing the train whistle and the bells. I think he and James ended up riding the train about 5 more times. We'd walk into the park and Seth would drag James off to the train and my sister Amy and I would push Jacob in the stroller to meet them at whatever their destination was. Going to Disneyland with Seth was so fun. We took our time, had naps every afternoon and only rode the rides that we really wanted to. Some highlights of the trip were the new Buzz Lightyear ride, Space Mountain and the Block Party. We rode "Buzz and Zurg" three times because Seth loved shooting the laser guns at all the aliens and at Zurg. I think James enjoyed it just as much as Seth did. He was really good at getting high scores. Space Mountain was finally open and we ended up getting fast passes for it three times before we were actually able to ride it (we kept missing our time slots). It had been a long time since I had ridden it and it was great to be on it again. The Block Party was over in the California Adventure park. It is basically a parade that stops at different places in the park and the characters from the Disney/Pixar movies dance and sing. This is something that Seth really wanted to see because we had seen commercials on TV of it and they showed Buzz Lightyear dancing. We ended up seeing the show twice because at the first stop we were stuck where the Monsters Inc. characters were dancing, which was fun, but it wasn't Buzz. So after the show moved on, I put the stroller into high gear and booked around the park to the next area so that we could see Buzz. It was a little bit disappointing because Buzz didn't actually dance. He just sat up in a float shaped like a space ship and moved his arms around to the music. There were other Toy Story characters that were on the street and very close to where we were standing. Seth was up on my shoulders and was dancing along with Woody and Jessie and the gang. It was exciting for him to see them in real life.

I had scare with Seth while we were at Disneyland. Amy and I were waiting on Main Street, holding a place so that we could see the parade. James and Seth had gone to get dinner. When they came back, James dropped off the food and went to get a hot dog for Seth. I thought he had taken Seth with him, but apparently he hadn't. About 15 minutes later, I saw a Disney Cast member walking down Main Street holding Seth in his arms. I jumped up and ran over to him and said, "That's mine!" I was thinking that James must be frantically searching for Seth so I headed over to the snack place to see if I could find him to let him know Seth was okay. I got there and James was calmly standing in line. I was baffled. I thought Seth was with him and he thought Seth was with me. I suppose it's the best way to lose a child since neither of you are freaking out about it, but it was also scary to realize how easily Seth could get lost. The funny part about the whole thing is that the reason Seth had wandered off was because he wanted to see the Choo Choo train again and he knew exactly where it was. The next day we safety pinned a tag to the back of his shirt that said, "Property of James and Miekka Lance." It had his name on it and James' cell phone number too. We also kept a much closer eye on him.

On the last day of our trip we went to Newport Beach and played on the beach for a few hours. It wasn't very warm and the water was really cold. Seth had fun making sandcastles, James tried to get our new kite to fly and Amy collected shells. I treated Jacob to his first picnic on the beach. It was a nice interlude before we started the long drive home.

I think I'll end the letter here since it has gotten much longer than I intended it to be. James and I are both doing fine and enjoying each other and our little family. We are very blessed. We love you all and hope you are happy.

Love James, Miekka, Seth and Jacob