The First Half...

I've been a little nostalgic lately. We officially reached 1.5 years of age and I have been wondering where the time has gone. When, exactly, did my skinny, chicken-legged little baby turn into this bright, happy, very energetic toddler that turns heads and brings smiles to faces everywhere we go? I guess this is something that all moms (and dads) go through with their kiddos. It just seems like it was just the other day that I was a teenager (sorry mom and dad... I know mine is coming to me!) and I was rolling my eyes when someone said, "You have gotten so big...". Anyway, so if you hadn't met Caleb when he was small, I included a couple of pictures, some of my favorites, of him in his tiny stage. The one above is of him during his last night in the NICU. It is my favorite of all the little baby pictures, and just happens to be the first one we took.
















This one is him humoring me as I drug him through yet another outing at the mall or WalMart or some place other than my house and couch!

In my last posting, I said that Caleb was supposed to have yet another trip to his pulmonologist and another swallow study. Well, his doctor's appointment went better than expected. If you have never taken a child to a pulmonologist's (lung doctor) office, then you need to know that every single time you go in they do some lung function tests. Just imagine trying to get a small child to hold still so that someone can press a smelly contraption over their face, making an air-tight seal, and getting them to breath normally so as to get good results. Not an easy task, but Caleb is a good sport and usually does a good job. This time, his tests came out to be what looked like normal patterns. In short, they think his asthma may have resolved! He is still taking his litany of medications to get him through RSV and flu season, but it's looking good on that front! His swallow study was not a good result as all. He failed, yet again and we are currently setting up to have him in therapy so that we can move this process along quicker. Hopefully this will work, as nothing else has...

Many of you don't know, but this past summer my parents went to Mexico on a mission trip. They brough back this duck (see above picture) for Caleb to push around while he walked. I was a little afraid that they had wasted their hard earned money because Caleb wasn't showing any interest in it. We set it upright in a very conspicious place in Caleb's playroom and hoped that he would someday notice it. Well, that day came last week. We had just returned home from school (his, not mine!) and he was playing in his playroom. I was in the kitchen washing dishes and I kept hearing this strange clicking noise. I called to Caleb to come to me (for now this still works) and the noise got closer and closer until I saw him round the corner at full speed pushing his duck in front of him. He's been obsessed with it ever since. Thanks MawMaw and PawPaw!

Another new trick Caleb has perfected in the past week or so is eating with a spoon. He used to stick the wrong end in the bowl and eat whatever it was that way. Needless to say, it would take him an hour to get through what he was eating. He had fun, but it sometimes tested my patience! Yet another thing that motherhood is teaching me, that not everything has to be done the way that I do it or in the time frame I think it should be done in!

I titled this posting The First Half because we will be taking a trip to the Dallas Arboretum tomorrow and will probably fill up another posting with pictures just from that. I just wanted to update you on the goings on in our home and with Caleb!