The End of an Era
I’m packing up my baby supplies and taking them home – Nathan is no longer coming into work with me. The exersaucer will have to wait until we have time to come by with the car and I may leave the hanging toys up for a little while longer – I’ve gotten used to them. It was wonderful having Nathan at work with me and I already miss it, but there is just no containing that kid! So now he’s having a great time at home with Daddy and Grammy and Helen and weekly adventure out to Bedford to hang out with Leah and the boys. I’m sure if you asked him, he’d say it’s a great new arrangement.
February 11, 2011
10:20pm
This time last year we were in an ambulance making our way from Mount Auburn Hospital to Beth Israel, unexpectedly preparing to meet our baby in the next few days. We had no idea it would be a matter of hours. What a night it was.
Happy Birthday Nathan
Nathan is ONE YEAR OLD! We still can't believe how far he has come. One of the many ways we chose to celebrate today was by having Nathan baptized. We could not think of a better way to express the great gift God gave us in our son. Here is the story we shared with our church, family and friends at Nathan's baptism:
Nathan was due April 29, 2011. Imagine our surprise when on February 11th, eleven weeks early, Katie’s water broke. Four hours later, at 12:32am on February 12th, we held our son for a few short minutes before he was whisked off to the NICU. In those first few days as we began telling and retelling his birth story, we were amazed at the way God had been present: our midwife was the one on call that night; the OB they sent us to at Beth Israel specialized in preterm labor; Nathan was born breathing on his own; everything went so quickly, we didn’t have time to panic.
For two weeks we told everyone that “aside from being early, Nathan is a really healthy kid”. And then we were challenged again. Nathan was diagnosed with a clot in his heart and a blood infection. He was transferred to Children’s Hospital. Because the clot itself was infected, the infection could not be cleared with antibiotics; bypass heart surgery to remove the clot had a 70% mortality rate; the infection, if left to run its course, would be terminal. We prayed for Nathan’s doctors and we prayed for a miracle. For five days we slept at the hospital as Nathan went through a high risk medical procedure and then was given a high risk medication. And when the risks became too high, we were told the only thing left to do was wait until Nathan was old enough for surgery.
With two weeks of waiting ahead of us, we went home, too exhausted to even be scared any more. That night we got a call from the NICU – the clot was 60% smaller! Nathan’s doctors called it a miracle; God had answered our prayers. Nathan would not need bypass surgery, the infection would clear, we got to keep our son.
That night we were reminded of what Nathan’s name means:
Nathan – God has Given; Timothy – Praising God.
Our prayer for Nathan is that he will grow up knowing that God’s hand was on him from the beginning. We pray that his life will be an example of the power of God and that he will live his life praising God. We want to encourage Nathan’s faith and model for him how to live in faith, and we know we cannot do this alone. We will need you, our family and friends, our church community, to support us as well as Nathan. We will need role models for godly parenting and Nathan will need friends and teachers to share with him the love of God. God has given us so many blessings this past year, and we celebrate that today — Nathan’s first birthday —as he is baptized.
Great Grandma Booth
Nathan’s Great Grandma Booth passed away in October. We haven’t talked about it here, because really, when you’re so bad at blogging already, how do you blog about a death in the family? But leading up to Nathan’s birthday, I dreamt about her every night. I always assumed she’d be here for his first birthday. Truth? I always assumed she’d see all my children graduate from college, but that was probably a bit optimistic.
When Nathan was in the hospital she would send me little emails, a quick word of love and encouragement. While being so proud of him, she never stopped telling me how proud she was of us, his parents. Almost all of her trips to Boston from Amherst in those three months included a stop by the NICU– sometimes that was the only reason for the trip.
When I was little, she and I would go to exercise class together. She would exercise and I would eat cheerios. When I was living with her a few years ago I learned that she started eating cheerios because of me and however many years later, she was still eating them. I think she would love that cheerios are one of Nathan’s favorite foods.
Quick (?) Recap
So, Nathan’s birthday.
It was a great day. Probably because it started with sleeping late and a bath. Any Sunday morning when Daddy doesn’t have to be at church by 7:30am and Mama doesn’t have to get herself + baby + loads of baby stuff to church all on her own (I know, I know, plenty of moms do that every week – just not me) promises to be a good day. And who doesn’t love a birthday bath?
Somehow we felt pretty low key and relaxed about having 20 family members descending on our bowling alley sized apartment for an afternoon of presents and cake. Nathan was initially not a huge fan of present opening because it interrupted his crawling, but once the floor was full of wrapping paper to play with, he was happy. Highlights were the many many many books and a 23 year old riding horse (like a rocking horse, but with wheels?) that was originally given to my cousin Michael on his first birthday by my Grandma & Grandpa Booth.
After presents we had cake. Again, being asked to sit still made for a grumpy baby, but as soon as we all started singing happy birthday he was happy again. The big green birthday candle was a hit, as was the cake, once Mama took charge. Why should a birthday boy have to feed himself? But after a few bites of cake Nathan was ready for cheerios. We have a strange kid. Somehow we don’t have any photographic evidence of party guests, but that doesn’t mean they weren’t there!
Eventually we had to kick everyone out so we could get ready for church. Nathan was baptized at our church’s 5pm service so that our friends and family could attend, but we were reminded of why we usually attend the 9am service – while 5pm is no longer bed time or nap time, it’s still not a great time to have Nathan in church because it’s now race around the house time. In spite of that fact, it all went well. When the pastor started talking about him, Nathan babbled at the congregation; he was sweet and quiet as he was baptized and blessed, and while I’m sure he thought about it, he did not cause any mischief with the holy water. At his baptism reception (yes, party #2) Nathan was having too much fun with his family and friends to eat anything, but even so, as we headed home at 8:30pm he was giggling away in the back seat. Maybe he was getting punchy. A long fun day was had by all.
I think we’ll do it again next year; maybe skip the baptism.
What counts as a word?
Everyone talks about their baby’s first word (either what it was or how they don’t remember what it was) but what counts as a first word?
We’ve been spelling out b-o-t-t-l-e for so long that I can’t remember when Nathan first realized what it meant, but I know the understanding came before he started using “bah” to mean bottle. And did “bah” (as in the ah of bah bah black sheep) for bottle come before or after “ba” (as in the a of all) for ball? And do these really count as First Words? Then there’s “mamamamamama”’s arrival and progression to “ma” and “mama” in the past month, but I’m pretty sure the ba’s came before the ma’s. And as sweet as a little boy calling his mama is, his more muted “ma” for yum and more came before the bright “ma” for mama.
So there you have it – as singers and parents we can happily identify the numerous “a” sounds with their varying consonants that Nathan comes up with, and some times we even know what he’s talking about, but we still couldn’t tell you what his first word was / is / might be.