Well hello everyone...after a LONG break from blogging, I have decided to return to it...
I even skipped right over Maddux's first birthday!! However, I have posted some of his "formal" one-year photos from Sears. I'm still in shock that he is already over one year old and that he looks like a little boy already. There is almost NO baby about him anymore!
As you can imagine...he keeps us busy and on our toes all the time. He is still not walking on his own, but we're thinking he will start soon. He just needs to work on some balancing and standing on his own first I think!!
Time has flown by of course. There have been some ups and downs in the last few months for us and our families. We continue to appreciate what blessings we have and get through the tough times together.
We found out at the end of March that we were expecting again. However, complications began on Easter weekend and by later April, we were able to finally figure out that it was an ectopic pregnancy. Last week I went in and everything checked out well, which is good. It's still very sad to lose a pregnancy like that. I have some friends and family members that have also lost pregnancies and now I can truly understand what that is like. Our 2nd baby would have been due in early December. But we have tried our best to get through those emotions and look forward to the future, and hopefully another successful pregnancy in our future.
Of course most of the "ups" in our lives revolve around our little man! If any lesson is to be learned by what we went through, it is that we must be grateful for Maddux's life and to appreciate what a miracle having a successful pregnancy and healthy child truly is!
In May, Tom and I ran the Fargo half-marathon in just under 2 hours, 10 min! I had to take a break in training due to the pregnancy but was able to resume afterward. It was a good, positive thing to focus on after that.
For Memorial Day, we took Maddux for his first trip to Papa and Gramma Gerhardt's house in Pollock, SD. It was a pretty good trip, except he was not comfortable sleeping there and had a meltdown in the middle of the night. But he was much more comfortable there by the 2nd day and thanks to Jay buying the Ferber book, we have managed to get him in a much better sleeping pattern, with no bottles before bed or middle of the night feedings. In fact, he's moved on to pretty much just sippy cups, with no bottles excpet at daycare when he sees the baby drinking from a bottle. How exciting ;)
Jay has done some work with landscaping around the house and getting the back yard seeded. My garden is more successful than last year, but I'm still not quite at the green thumb level. We both continue to work full-time and still try to have some fun.
We were able to get a short vacation to Minneapolis in June to see a couple Twins/Braves games which was a blast! We took maddux to the first night's game and then Jay's mom and aunt watched Maddux for the 2nd night's games so we could go with Jay's dad and uncle. That was the first time I had gotten to see my faviorite MLB team live plus we got to go to the Twins new Target Field stadium! Maddux did very well traveling until about the last 200 miles of the trip. I don't blame him, as I would not want to sit in a car seat that long either!!
The weekend after Minneapolis we had a big 1st birthday bash for Maddux - it was baseball-themed and I had a blast planning it and decorating for it! We even got a great game of wiffle ball in with everyone. Maddux cooperated in diving into his cake and I got to open all his presents for him - he was more interested in the cards! Lots of family & friends contributed to make it a very fun and special birthday celebration!
Yesterday we went to the funeral of Janell Hellman, a family friend and a sister-in-law of our sister-in-law, Val. This was just such a devastating loss to her family, friends and the whole community. Janell battled cancer for 7 years, and in the end it was just too much for her to fight. Our hearts and prayers continue to go out to her family, especially the husband and 3 girls she left behind. We know that her legacy of kindness, strength, courage and hope will live on and we are truly honored to have known her. We will have a small token of what she meant to people, as she made Maddux's baptismal bib for him last year. She did that for all the babies baptized at Sacred Heart in Glen Ullin and for family and friends' babies. We will be happy to tell Maddux someday how special that baptismal bib really is, and to tell him about Janell.
With the experiences of life and death, we try to take with us lessons to be learned and hope for the future.
And our family's story continues....
