A Message from Tobo

That's right, we are expecting again! Baby #2 is due February 29, 2012. Tobo is looking forward to being a big helper...as long as he doesn't have to share his toys!

I'm feeling really good other than fatigue and forgetfulness.

Thank you for your prayers for our family!

the new new new reality

As most of you know, we have been in the process to go to Singapore with OMF International since April 2010. Before my father passed away in late April, the field leadership gave us a benchmark of mid May to see God bring our finances at least up to 80% for us to continue as candidates for the IT position in Singapore. We are now well past mid May and looking at our numbers and well . . . they just aren't where they need to be for us to continue as we have. So we are withdrawing our names. Paul said it best in this email he sent last week to our leadership:

It is with mixed personal feelings, but great confidence in the Lord, that I write to you to withdraw our names for the IT Manager role at IHQ; I would like to thank ... all those who have been so supportive and encouraging us to follow wherever God may be leading us.
I will say this: I am certain I do not wish to go anywhere that God is not paving the way for us to go! Please pray as we re-adjust our plans and seek again to know what God has for us next.

We are planning on taking the next 3 months to pray,talk, think, decompress, etc. in order that we can honestly seek after the Lord to confirm where he is leading us next. Right now we are kind of a mess in various mundane ways and for good reason. Our co-laborers at OMF have been very caring and understanding as we try to work out the kinks in our plans and dreams and what God is doing with them. And we do appreciate everyone's prayers for our family -- I believe we are doing as well as we are because of your prayers, make no mistake.

In the short term we will continue to work at the U.S. Headquarters as the IT Coordinator (Paul) and in Communications (Cat). I am actually kind of excited about this since giving up US Mobilization was something I was finding hard to do.(I can quit any time I want to.) These are both support-based positions, which mean we are still under-funded even though we aren't going anywhere. We are going to have to address that in the near future, but I think God will allow us to catch our breaths emotionally and spiritually before we continue to press on into the next great adventure. We'll see where we are in fall. I'll continue to write and post as things come to me, but I felt this needed to be said first before I can really start writing again.

In the meantime, you can help by praying for us as we adjust to the new new new reality of 2011.

...but I already bought the turkey!

God is working in mysterious ways again in our lives. Where it seemed that we were kind of in a stalled front (think weather) a month or so ago, the bottom fell out of our carefully laid plans at 4:30p on Monday. I learned almost by accident that we will not be able to stay in our current apartment after December 30. We must move. It turns out that our complex is at the end of a remodeling plan and we are one of the last hold outs. I am so thankful that Paul poked me into calling a little early so we weren't completely up the crick. We will need to give our 30 days notice by Nov 30 to be in accord with our lease. We've asked to see if we can go month-to-month, but I'm not holding my breath on that. If we can't go month-to-month then we are stuck with moving before Dec 15 because of holiday travel plans. It will be Awe.Some.

The management has given us the option to transfer to a new apartment in the same community we are in or transfer to a larger apartment in a different community. All of these options will raise our rent. (some more than others) We are saying goodbye to the nice sublet price we've had while we were here and really that can only be expected. We're looking around on craiglist and asking around at church and work to see if there is another option. If you know of anything, by all means please drop us a line. But really we are relying on God and stepping out in faith that he will provide for us. (This has been my reading recently. Silly Lilies.)

Singapore is still on. We had hoped to be able to just exit gracefully at the end of this lease this year but that has not been what God had in mind. We are now trying to get a year least and hope to go by the end of next year or possibly early 2012. All of this delay is not a bad thing but gives us more time to get ourselves right with God and all the loose ends that seem to have sprung up in recent months. But it is also a bit of lesson in humility and our complete reliance on Jesus as our provider. We don't do humility so good. We apparently need more practice.

SO all that is to say that things are changing, and we are coveting your prayers for wise decisions instead of snap decisions.

And I have seriously have invited people over to my house for turkey next week. We'll make it a a game.
Pack a box.
Eat turkey.
Pack a box.
Eat turkey.
It will be great!

tea time

So today I had the honor of having some ladies over to watch pride and prejudice (2005) version from our small group I so rarely attend these days. I made really tea and had tea cookies and everything. :) It was bonus fun to hang out with folks and watch something in my home and that is actually a very good movie Hopefully folks had fun, I certainly did. To get ready for this event I finally got things put away and organized the front room so we really can have folks over again. I'm surprised, but I find I really do enjoy hosting. Nothing too fancy of course, there will be few feats of cookery at my place, but I do like to make a comfortable talking place for folks.

Part of my preparation meant Tobo and I went to the store on Friday to pick up said cookies. Since he's been getting better and better at sitting by the day (hardly surprised when he falls now) I thought, "Let's see if you're steady enough to be in the cart, mister 15 lbs."And sure enough, here's my big kid at the store:


(quality is low because all I had was my phone camera with me at the time)

I just can't believe how fast he's picking things up (literally) these days. After much internal debate, I gave in and gave him some cheerios to play with. I was paranoid he would choke. I did not realize that by the time he figures out how to get the cheerio in his mouth, he'll be a lot more able to gum it and swallow. Currently after much work he can get one in his fist, but then sticks the whole fist in his mouth. It's like giving a dog peanut butter. So, I'm not as worried as before. He's also highly entertaining with a sippy cup. Doesn't really get much out of it (other than on his shirt) but is really excited to be using a "big kid" thing. We have many fine lunches this way.

He was being such a pill this day that I took out my phone and took his picture and then showed it to him. The crying stopped almost immediately and we were able to go on with our day. (for a while anyway)



we stayed up passed bed time last night to watch the debate.

That one's for chesh and wmw. I found Tobo staring enthralled with Senator Obama's voice...but then he noticed I had my phone out again. Paul went to the libertarian shindig last night and I believe plans to vote for their candidate Bob Barr. I'm being my usual undecided self. I'm pleased with both candidates and really enjoyed watching a debate where the candidates were able to talk to each other. Looking forward to the next one.

For now, I'm going to finish my library book and crash.

the muppet show: a few thoughts

So I recently got the first disk of the first season of the muppet show, circa 1976. A few thoughts:

The first opening act is: Mahnahmahnah


The second opening act is: Lydia the tattooed Lady (ie. Groucho marx)


The third opening act is: comedy tonight! - Something Funny Happened on the Way to the Forum


The third episode followed up with Willkommen (Cabaret) and Razzle Dazzle Them (Chicago)

Posit: If you were raised on the muppet show, you know musical theater better than you think.

EDIT: Posit #2: You can find anything on Youtube.com

back from there

We are back from the great land of michigan after a two week vacation/deputation visit. It was a really good time to remember what's good about the west coast (of the mitten) and get our fill of high humidity, sunlight, soft evenings, pretty sunsets, and cows. Thank you to everyone who came out to the open house. It was great to see so many people come out for hot dogs and look at the baby. A couple of special folks that we saw:

My uncle and aunt from the far north came down to coo over tobo:



Finally got tobo and Ch together.


We also were so pleased to see uwee's mom and dad as well as far flung friends from kzoo and St. Joe who made the trip. It was a great time.

Paul and I did go to the Beyond Beijing conference in Byron Center the next day, which as an amazing testimony for the work that is going on in China. I hope to say more about that in our prayer letter if I ever can finish it before August. We also caught dinner with a old friends in their new house and we got a chance to catch up with the IV staff worker at Kzoo just before we left. Oh, and we did get out sans tobo, but only for an hour or so due to exhaustion. All in all it was a good trip, but we are ready to be home.

Two weeks in baby time is crazy long, so Tobo has developed a number of new skills while we were away. Tobo can now:
- roll over. In his sleep. Which is most exciting
- one -hand grab toys
- teethe (which means drool)
- sleep in his crib with the light out
- grab at your plate at the table
- grab your finger and chew on it (see teething)
- do baby situps (with help from momma)
- found his feet. (didn't do anything else with them but tried to bend over to get them)
- has probably put on another .5 lb to make him 13 lbs

We tried a little smashed banana today, a lot of it got pushed back out, so I think we'll wait a bit and try again in a week or two. No rush. Really the teething is what's got his attention these days. He's sleeping more consistantly (9pm bed \ up at 1:30a to eat \ up at 4:30a to eat \ up between 6:30 and 7am for the day) and we're at least not up ever single hour of the night. Some of that is we've started to put him to sleep on a blanket on our bed, then when he's floppy we move him and the blanket to the crib. It worked really well until he started rolling in his sleep. So, now he's on a very thin blanket that we tuck in to the mattress once we move him. I think we made the mistake of putting to sleep in arms just to have him wake up when we put him down. But he's so much more alert and aware than he was. I think he will find our place boring now since there is no one here but us.

Paul and I are are glad to be home. It was a welcomed break, but we came home to yet another qwest dsl box on our steps. We now have 6 modems that need to be shipped back. We also came home to clean carpets and many dead spiders. Hopefully we won't have to have the pest control back until fall. I think the spiders are really a summer thing around here.

Today, I think we are doing laundry and may hang some pictures up. I'm certainly taking the day off, not sure if Paul is going to go in or not. Oh, and banana boy will most definitely be getting a bath today.

Lots of photos over at:

From Cute Things M...

home again

We are tired and happy here at the hoemke home. We just got back from our trip to Florida to baptize the boy. The service was perfect -- small and intimate. Tobo learned so much from his godbrothers. He was facinated to watch them playing on the floor, goofing around and generally being boys. It's like the little switch clicked in his brain saying "oh..I get it! I'm suppose to interact with my environment!" This has lead to a couple of major steps:

1. tobo now giggles. Daddy is very excited about this development.
2. tobo is now ticklish. See 1.
3. tobo now can be come bored. (This ceiling is boring. Where is the ceiling fan to watch?)
4. tobo likes to sit either on your lap or in front of your lap as you hold him and look around. He has great head control and very strong little legs.
5. tobo also likes to stand up (with a spotter) and look around. He's even taken a few steps.
6. tobo likes to lean forward when he's sitting in your lap (with a spotter) to "get a better look at something." You have to really watch him that he doesn't go over on his head. He hasn't really figured out that he can use his hands to investigate too.
7. tobo shows no interest in learning to roll over. He'd rather run.
8. tobo is a drooler. Oh my, can this boy drool. We call him mr. bubbly.
9. tobo hates to be put down. Especially on his back. This has made bed time exciting.
10. tobo's bed just moved to a stand alone bassinet at the foot of our bed. [insert sad mommy face]
11. All of this happened in the last week. *phew*

The decision about the bassinet has been in the works for a few weeks, in a fit of hyper exhaustion (super tired) I moved it today (and got a good vacuuming under everything, spiders were back!) and set him up on his own little island by the door. I'm truly sad about the move but this is one of those better for him decisions and he's ready. He's been sleeping on his own in swings for the last few weeks as we've been traveling about. He made something close to 12 hours the second night we were at the cottage because he was so exhausted. We need to figure out if we're going to let him cry it out or not. I was hoping to wait til 6 months just to give him a bit of maturity to handle being alone, but I think still having him in the room transitioning eventually to his own crib in his own room is the way to go.

He's officially 12 lbs 5 oz. His feet were dangling off the office scale today. We took him in because he seemed to be reacting to something I ate. Dr. told us (after running some tests on his stool) that it was probably nothing but he'd check on him at his 4 mth apt in a few weeks. I think we probably over reacted but we are tired.

We also came home to find that our dsl modem was limping along. Hope to be getting a new one in the mail on monday. I think we'll buy it out right because this one lasted 4 years, making it not worth the renting. Fool me once shame on you. Fool me twice shame on me, you know.

I've been looking at the jumper thing Paul has wanted to get Tobo since he was born. I'm seeing a lot of folks using them at 4 months on, so I'll probably see if we can pick one up when we're back from Mich. [ed: or tomorrow. Paul is now bouncing up and down of his own accord in anticipation]

Tobo was a great traveler which makes me thing that this age is the easiest to get them around (that and once they can read for pleasure). He pretty much went into the sling as soon as we boarded the airplane and slept until we exited the airplane for all 4 flights. We took him out and fed/played/changed him in between and came home with an ok baby. Ok, in that he does not sleep the first night, but takes 24 hours to get back into routine. What is our routine, darned if I know, but I'm sure we have one. We're still doing on demand nursing, which means I got better at public nursing through all those airports. We actually got the sling to work with that so now I feel a little more confident about getting out there and feeding him. I still find a quiet nook, mainly to keep mr curious on task.

Anywho, here we are home again. I'm reading harry potter 3 (poa) and watershipdown. What are you up to?

that's for babies

We spent Father's Day weekend up at the OMF cabin this weekend, a much needed holiday from everything. Dad (as we now call him) got a chance to hang out with Tobo and *not* be stressed out, which i think the little boy loved (!) to get that time. After watching them play, I began to realize that I've really been keeping tobo to a newborn/infant routine (sleep/eat/sleep/eat) and he's really read for something more challenging. A few exciting developments:
- tobo is actually pretty good at sitting at the moment. He wants to sit up. He wants to look around. No more of this baby laying around stuff.
- we mentioned the fist
- he actually got kind of interested in a toy this weekend, kinda. (We call it Martian Puppy) He had a great game of knocking him down with his fist.
- He loves having you play with his feet and Paul started having him play a game called "launch" where we hold his feet and he tries to turn over.
- he turned over on his belly a few times but with help. He's really close to doing it himself.
- the rash of d00m(tm) has finally left his bum. Though I doubt we will go anywhere without a yeast cream until he's potty trained, just in case.
- he went on his longest car ride ever (1 hour!) And complained most of the way because the sun was often in his eyes. We've installed sun screen now in the back window which seems to make it much easier
- he was up as high as he has ever been, at 7,220 ft.

He's also getting a lot bigger. I'll try and get a weigh in tonight, but he's officially too long in the torso for 0-3mths clothing as is his head diameter too big to get comfortable in 0-3's anymore. I just spent the last 30 minutes packing up all the footie pj's and getting out and washing the 6-9mth stuff. It's only a matter of time. It's also getting to be warmer here so we need to get away from fleece things and think about oneies for sleeping. My little boy ain't so little anymore. I'm sad to see the little baby stuff go, but the cool little boy stuff is coming up. Mixed feelings on this one.

I also have a confession to make. While we were at the cabin we tried out disposables again...and Tobo slept through the night. So, unless we can find someone who can trouble shoot or pocket diapers, we're going to start doing disposables at night. We're talking the difference of 1 diaper vs usually 3 diaper changes a night. We all need the sleep more than we need to protect the environment. I'm still doing prefolds in the day, and plan to do so as he gets bigger, but yeah. I make a sad face about having to give up on my latest hobby - stripping mineral deposits from diapers. :(

I also had tobo put himself to sleep at the cabin. We were up in the morning playing and at some point he just laid down. I laid down next to him to do a little face time cuddling and at some point he just looked at me and then turned over and went to sleep as if to say, "You relax mother. Get a cup of coffee. I'm going to nap here for a bit, but I'll play with you in a little while." Such a big kid now. We're also talking about changing our sleeping arrangement this week, so tobo gets ready to not be right next to our bed while we're traveling. (same room though) I'm just too aware of him at night, so I'm jumping up to trouble shoot at every little noise. I just don't believe that he's just making noise in his sleep. So, for our sanity, we're thinking of unhooking the bassinet-side car and just use it as a stand alone. He's still fits in it, but we've probably only got a month or two left before he will be too big for it.

Also started digging around to find out what we need to do to travel with tobo in June. Apparently not much, unless the airline decides to get a bee in its bonnet. This trip we are lucky, we got our tickets before the crazy bag-charging thing. Christmas we won't be as lucky. Talked with the priest-in-charge this afternoon and had a lovely conversation about the baptism. I am looking forward to it. Obviously I need to figure out what the boy's going to wear now that he's grown out of all his most likely outfits.

This week is insane. Lots of stuff at work (being candidate course) a meeting with our church to talk about omf more, friends from out of town coming through on Thursday, possible sighting of our bro-in-law as he passes through town to a funeral, planning meeting with our accountability partner for our partnership development, possibly scheduled meeting with carseat expert to explain our car seat to us with out the base and, um spiders. We had a bunch of spiders move in while we were away. They all showed up at the midnight feeding, which was um...shocking. I ended up waking up Paul to deal with them, tobo in arms because as i said we where in the middle of a feeding when these things came running across the carpet. Ack! hopefully we got them all, but it was just not a cool way to end the evening.

I'll try to post pictures soon.

our lives are getting more interesting

Today is a good day. for the first time since I moved to CO, I will be able to recycle where I live. They are starting a beginners racquetball class at the fitness center. I'm a lb away from my pre-pregnancy weight. Tobo slept until 10am this morning, meaning I slept in til 9:45am. Life is good!

Speaking of tobo, here are some photos:

not the comfy chair! He's really not a fan of going in the car seat unless we are moving.


hanging out in the sling. This is my hot-chick sling from before. Tobo actually will sleep in this while we're at the office and I'm working.


helping mom with the camera. Well, he's still not reaching out for things, other than kisses from momma on his hand.


so happy to be playing on the changing table! This is what it's all about.


I'm awake! Hanging out with grand-nana's blanket again. He likes it a lot and it's a great size for traveling. Warm too.

From Cute Things M...

Tobo is somewhere around 11 weeks old now. Highlights these days include:

• My fist is delicious!
• I *hate* waking up and not knowing where I am. I rage RAGE at the world, especially if I'm hungry.
  
• I'm cool with the sling, though we'd better be going somewhere in it.
• I like to sleep through the night as long as I feel dry. Otherwise, we're up every couple of hours.
• I am sooo sleepy after a day of hanging out with other people.
• I'm about to go on my first airline trip in a few weeks.
• I'm almost old enough to go in the nursery at church, if momma can let me go. [Apparently the separation anxiety is *much worse* at 6mths than at 3mths]
• I am still howling but now I've added sounds like "il-lee" "go-gaw" and "eh." I especially like it when mom or dad (or both) sing back to me with these sounds.
• My rash is almost gone, though it's trying really hard to branch out to other parts of my bottom.
• My cradle cap is receding thanks to tree tea oil (not allergic to it!) and a bit of selsan blue.

I also wanted to put a diaper update. I know I left you all hanging on the edge of your seats about my diapers. :) Was it the dryer sheets in the dryer on non-diaper loads? Was it hard water? Was it left over diaper rash cream? The answer is...yes. All three were contributing to the problem. I'm happy to say that after doing a stripping in dawn, and then a stripping in calgon (water softener NOT bath salts) the fuzzybunz AND the bumgenius have gotten better. They are still not 100%, but they are at least useable. The down side is that my other fuzzybunz is starting to seize up, which means that it looks like I'm either going to have to strip diapers every 2 weeks for mineral deposits OR find the right amount to add to my laundry loads so that they never seize up to begin with. I'm happy that my mom-in-law wants to do cloth diapers when we're in Mich. We'd talked about doing it for florida too, but my folks have a HE washer, so I'd need advice on what I'd need to do differently. It also means lugging all of our diapers with us (because tobo will use them all in a day) but it might be worth it to avoid more diaper out break.

Our lives are getting more interesting. Paul has volunteered to help with the senior high youth at church, which means he was out sliding down the slip and slide on baby oil Sunday evening. I'm starting that as a movie night for myself and tobo so that I get a bit of relaxing too during the week. We're schedule to join a small group / home group thing on Tuesday this week. I'm hoping it goes well and I'm pretty sure it's what I want to do. Of course, I'm not totally sure what goes on at these protestant small groups. It will be a new experience. I'm debating putting tobo in the nursery for service. At the moment, we're doing sunday school at 9, hang out in between and then service at 10:45a. Or rather Paul is doing this. I'm usually feeding tobo in between and then coming in after the music but for the message. So I guess what I would do is the same, but I'd just leave him in the nursery for the last 30 minutes instead of taking him with me. I'm not quite ready to do this, so we'll see. I need to read up on my development books for his age, cause I have no idea what to expect at the moment.

Work is going alright. This week starts candidate course for June, which is what we went through in October last year. This time around I'll be making business cards and prayer cards for folks, while trying to wrap up a few other projects. I'm hoping to commit to a schedule at work so people know when I'm in the office. Now that Paul and I have been switched to what amounts to "salaried" at OMF (instead of employee and contractor) we can set up flex time for both of us. I'm still working from home, but I just need to be visible there so people don't think they have been abandoned.

I must dig out my kitchen so Tobo can get a bath later. so I'm off to clean up a bit.

breaking in the habit

ATTENTION: this post has nothing to do with Tobo. : )

So today is bible day. If you know me, you know that I struggle with reading the bible in any kind of a regular way. I'm not familiar with it. I want to know it like the back of my hand, but I don't. That might be a bit a shock from a missionary in the US but it's true. My background is Episcopalian, which means that I generally know all major points of protestant faith, but don't ask me to quote a verse or how to communicate these points to anyone else. Kind of sad for someone who is suppose to be lighting people on fire to take their part in the great commission. If you do ask me to state my faith, I have a tendency to end up saying the Nicene Creed. (which isn't bad in itself)


So I'm trying something new - bible day. It's simple: I pick a book of the bible and read it to it's conclusion during the course of one day. So in between Tobo's bath, laundry, meals, and naps, I'm reading Romans. If you listen very closely you can hear Paul jumping up and down with glee. I'm also reading along with it a commentary on romans by Nygren. It's harder than it sounds. I'm only writing to you now because I'm eating lunch. Discipline is one of my weak points.

So far I'm not feeling too overwhelmed. I keep telling myself that I'm reading over the whole book and then go back and dive into the meat of it once I have the whole picture. I read the commentary introduction first which has helped a lot.

In the meantime i'd like to challenge you to a) read along at home and b) pray for all of us reading that we will be strong in our resolve to stick to this new habit.

Happy Hunting.

being green + babbling about diapers

I found this story from instapundit about how it isn't easy, being green. Since reading what wmw had to say on her blog about diapers and the environment(and since I started participating by diapering the bug (ie tobo) in cloth) I have really started to think about what kind of a foot print we are leaving behind. If there are less wasteful (and ideally cheaper) ways we could be living by making simple changes to what we buy and how we throw it out.

Back to the article. I guess it is not surprising that it is greener to live like sardines, than to live in the'burbs. I was surprised thought that they state it's greener to drive a used car than a hybrid. So what we need to do is wait for the used-hybrid market to pick up. In a million years.

but back to the diaper news you all are waiting to hear with baited breath: :)

I'm now on a quest to find Country Safe, which, in liquid form, will work with our crazy hard water AND clean my diapers. I'm officially ruling that the simple green+washing soda thing just doesn't work here in hardwater land. I did an extreme stripping of the bumgenius yesterday [boil water, tsp dawn, scrub bg on the inside with dawn, take water off heat, stick diaper in water until cools, wash like normal] to no avail, which leads me to believe that the detergent is the problem. It has sealed up the fuzzy bun once again, never fixed the bg, and has periodically solidified the thirstes aio too. So, we move on to see if CountrySave really is good in hard water. This is based on the recommendation of a cottonbabies customer service rep, who gave me the idea to boil my diaper. I did find out from her though that the reason the bg is being so difficult is because the weave is much tighter than you're average pocket, which means that once it gets coated, it is hard to get clean.

but I digress. I had thought I would find CS at our local veggie co-op, but no good. I then went by the new fancy-smancy grocery store and found that they not only didn't have CS, but they didn't have Calgon either. (an alternative suggestion from the rep) Favorite moment: the 16-year-old checker nicely told me she's never heard of Calgon, was it some kind of soap? Har! What was crazier is that she offered to order it for me if I wanted, no extra cost. (I told her to get CS instead, after I picked my jaw off the floor.) Apparently to get an item at the store just need to ask for it. Like Brummel and Brown strawberry spread? Ask for it by name. Unfortunately it will take 2 weeks to come in so I'm still going to see if I can find it else where. Can't not use our pockets for 2 weeks waiting for safeway to maybe order something that someone might have remembered to write down at the end of her shift on a wednesday night. She didn't take down my name or anything either. So that means they really do take orders seriously and will order it on the assumption that someone will by it or they have electronic tracking devices that link up to a database of all their customers, and were tracking me through the store. Pick your paranoia.

We got our big bonanza of diaper stuff in yesterday evening, including a wet/dry bag, pail liner, flannel wipes(50 cents a wipe), and rice paper liners. Tobo doesn't really know what to think of the liners, but they should slow the butt cream transfer ratio to our expensive diapers immensely. They also work, which is awes0me. I won't go into details, but yeah, it's cool. The wipes are exactly what I was hoping for, simple, big enough, and washable. I also got a spray bottle to make life easier when cleaning up the baby.

The other excitment this week has been attack of the cradle cap. (or cradle crap as my mom-in-law calls it) Because of the crazy hot day Tuesday, Tobo's head had a massive break out. Any suggestions for dealing with it?

excited about life

So tobo woke up this morning excited about life. We finally got him settled around 12midnight last night so I was expecting to hear from him around 4am. Imagine my surprise when it rolled around to 7am! I only woke up because he was having a cooing conversation with the lamp. So we are getting close to being on his feeding schedule and not his diaper schedule. (Hurray!) Can't wait to see what it's like to travel with this little guy in June. He was so bright-eyed and bushy tailed that we played on the floor gym a bit:

(I am sorry if I've spammed you all about the youtube thing. I am still learning how it works)



We had a conversation about the mirror and how fun it was to kick things. He is soo close to finding his fist to suck on. I'm about ready to start pulling out the rattles and grabbing toys, though I'm tempted to buy him one of these: (so cute!)



We've talked about doing somethings today, but nothing really planned. Possibly clean the bathrooms, maybe vacuum, possibly go out to a bookstore. Really getting a nap would be awesome.

bye bye pump

Tobo is doing much better this morning. Just a little sore around the shot sites. I forgot to mention that he was giving the nurse a run for her money, his legs were so strong she was having a hard time holding on to him. (that's my boy!) He also passed all the little developmental road signs that mean he's turning into a little boy. next check up in 2 months.

It feels like its the end of a chapter. Not only did Tobo just do his 2 month check up, but today I packed up the breast pump. It's been nice to have it as a back up, especially in expressing enough milk to have in the freezer as a bit of a bank, but I'm not using it as much as I once did so I guess I'm really saying 'goodbye crutch.' We're going to try going without it and see how it goes. It's possible to rent these for a week at a time if necessary, and if we need to for whatever reason, we'll get it again. Goodbye security blanket. It means we're committed to working out breast feeding outside the house. I've been invited to check out the La Leche League with a friend, which I might do now to get tips and pointers. So here's to winging it!

Paul and I were challenged on Monday to get back to paying attention to our partnership development. (Which is why we set up accountability meetings with a good friend to keep us on track!) So, I'm hoping to turn this blog a bit more towards topics other than tobo in the future. I'll keep updating on him, but I also hope to tell you what I do with the rest of my time. So here's what else is going on:

The big time suck has been emergency projects for ACME. We had the annual report due as well as Global Chinese Missions and now Prayer Powerlines has snuck back on my plate when I wasn't looking. What me and the team in the office are trying to find is the balance between what time I have and what time they need. I was able to work on some of this because I worked last Saturday for a few hours. I'm putting in about 10 hours a week towards design projects, usually in the morning during Tobo's first nap. He's in the swing behind me now as I work at the dining table on my laptop. Ideally, I'd like to have more than a day or two before getting an assignment, because I have to plan for time to work with Paul, but these were delayed by the clients not the comms team, so I worked my hardest to turn them around. I find getting back into the groove a little choppy, but over all the designs weren't bad and will do for the short notice. I don't think I've done any fancy designing since November last year. I sort of went off it as the pregnancy developed. Well no more. What is difficult is while midstep of changing over leadership from the old to the new in comms, we're trying to change the way we serve the fellowship. So I'm trying to get my head around not only what the needs are, but also what the future goals are. Needless to say, we need more designers and writers. (if you know any one who wants to join in missions and raise support, let me know!)

I'm also thinking about joining a new walking club that's started at our complex. We do have a full exercise room at the complex office, but I really need the commitment to keep me active during the week. I'm also struggling with my weight. Breast feeding is not taking the pounds off anymore, and though I'm watching what I eat, I'm seem to be at a plateau. It's an annoying plateau because its 5 lbs heavier than I need to be to get out of my pregnancy pants. :/ So they are huge, but my pre-pregnancy pants are just a bit too tight to wear comfortably. Maybe when Tobo is eating more this will be easier, but in the mean time, foo. I hate the idea of joining weight watchers again. I'm just not motivated with their meals. I guess I could always do curves. (more south beach diet like) hrmm.

Paul and I are also trying to get more involved with our church. He's decide to try helping out with the high school youth. I'm debating about trying out one of the women's small group. Bethany has a women's bible study on Mondays and a womens' small group on tuesdays. I'm not totally sure what the difference is, but I assume there is a good chance that the bible study will *actually* be a bible study and not a cry fest. [<-- the reason I don't normally do girl groups. Too much sharing, not enough doing.] I am tempted to start a craft ministry, but might try something called White Cross, which meets once a month to do sewing projects (They sew, prepare hospital bandages and make crafts for Lydia Home Association in Chicago as well as fellowship and have a short devotional. ) Not quite what I do, but at least it's something to do with my hands. Also, I should get my pysanky stuff together. :D

So that's the news from here. What are you all up to now?

shots and growing up

So tobo had his 2 month check up today. He is now 22.24 inches long (40%) and weighs 10lbs 1oz. (25%) His head is now 14.25" (23%). He's almost doubled his weight in 2 months.

I knew he had to get shots, but no one told me there would be so many tears to go with the 5 shots he got as part of the immunization stuff. The tears really didn't turn up until we started getting him ready for bed. Tobo started off life with people poking him in the heel every day for the first week. He was such a trooper, that tonight's tears have really taken me aback. This must be what having a colicy baby is like _all_the_time_. We've given him a dose of infant Tylenol and he is calmer and sleeping. I should have known something was up when the nurse gave us the Tylenol on our way out the door. :'/

mother's day

I did not worry about diaper cream on mother's day. I did something more constructive, like put together the changing table. It has had a long journey, but has finally arrived at our home.



It felt good to finally complete something. We also managed to vaccum and wash all of our bedding. (see previous post) We finished the day by watching some sci-fi, all of us cuddled on the couch, eating pizza. It was a great mother's day. The best part of it was tobo. He's really what I was celebrating.

its got to be the cream

I really should change the name of this blog to "Tales of Tobo's Butt". We were back on the phone with the nurse Sat morning. It looked like Tobo had a reaction to the diaper cream so I was out at the drug store at 9am getting an even kinder, gentler butt creams for Tobo. The nurse also suggested aveeno oatmeal bath treatment 2 or 3 times a day. She kindly added to that, I know how hard that is with a newborn. (thank you for realizing bath time takes a half hour to wind up for and a half hour to wind down from, plus clean up)

But we now have a wide array of cream options. So this is my review of diaper rash creams in hope that someone else doesn't have to go through what we have with this rash of d00m:

• Destin - BAD - coated the cloth diapers in cod oil and very zincy in smell
• Burt's Baby Bee Diaper Ointment- BAD - caused his toosh to become red-er, the sores worse, and still managed to coat the diapers in random flower oils. I suspect our hard water didn't help.
  

Boudreaux's Butt Paste - OK - didn't have a good reaction or a bad reaction to this, but does have mineral oil in it, so probably could coat the diapers if we gave it a shot.

Lanolin from Lansinoh - GOOD - current winner, totally neutral ingredients (no zinc) and is suppose to "melt" out of the diapers in the wash...we'll see.

Aveeno diaper rash cream - ???- haven't tried it but have it on back up but does have mineral oil in it.

I'm beginning to suspect that either our water is hard enough that it is complicating things and/or the medication tobo is on has a cod oil base. (He's on nystatin) We will once again be stripping the pocket diapers since we are having a pee-ilarious weekend, what with the leaks and all. Saturday Tobo's diaper managed to leak in his bed, on the changing table and on Paul's baby blanket through to our mattress pad. Fortunately we caught it in time before it soaked all the way through to our loverly bed. (best mattress in the world!) I am about to invest in a set of bum geniuses..assuming that it isn't design but chemicals that is causing them to leak. Though honestly I'm having trouble with our thirsty all-in-one too, so I think it's got to be the cream.

To complicate matters, he has been in and out of disposables this week during trips to the office and one night where we got out to dinner with friends. It hasn't made it too much worse, but it really makes me doubtful that we should do disposables when on the ground in Florida and Michigan this summer. It looks like he inherited my sensitive skin.

so tobo learn that his throat and nose are connected yesterday. I never knew that babies could squirt milk from their nose. We suggested that he not do that again since it hurts. We are getting to a slow start this week. We didn't make it to church yesterday, but I did get a few hours in on the annual report, which is due on tuesday. Tobo was content to sleep in the swing for those hours. He seems to be following this pattern:

12mid - last feeding/change
4/5a - diaper crisis! a bit hungry
6a - back to sleep
8a -diaper crisis! Ready for breakfast
9a - first nap
10/11/12 - wake up confused and possibly hungry. Where's my mom?!
12noon - time to eat a serious meal
1/2 - second nap
3p - air time if we haven't had any yet today, mid day snack
4/5p - dad, that awsome guy, is home and plays with me! Who needs mom!
6p - diaper crisis! serious eating. no one has fed me for days.
7p - did I mention I'm still hungry?
8/9p -mom and dad make the first attempt to get me to go to sleep oh and, diaper crisis!
12mid - diaper crisis! and I'm a wee bit peckish

Last night didn't follow any of this pattern. It didn't because I tried baby powder on his back side during the day. Just so you know baby powder = friction in this dry climate. We highly suggest not using it. We spent most of the evening fussing, then I went and stretched out on the couch and let him sleep on me from 12midnight to 2am. This is when I woke up and found I was still on the couch. The rest of the evening was a dance of me putting him down, him fussing and crying, me picking him up changing him and trying to feed him and rock him. Blah. Of course, today was the big communications meeting brain dump of the head designer at ACME, which I really needed to be present for. So at 6:30a I gave up getting back to sleep and just got up and put on the coffee. Really it wasn't a bad day. Tobo was back to being the perfect baby. I stopped with the powder after 3a but not in time for him to get a new red bottom. *sigh* [This is looking much better this evening. We're still going to the doctor tomorrow morning.] He hung out with Paul at work while I was in the meeting, then we all went home for lunch. Got to love an IT guy who comes around to talk to you about your computer with his baby in his arms. :) Though its not a long term solution, it's really fun while he's this small.

interesting facts

so, because of the medical clearance we are trying to get for ACME, Paul and I have been in out of doctor offices for the last 2 days. During this medical romp, I have found out a few interesting facts.

I'm shorter. - Since having tobo I'm officially 3 inches shorter than I thought I was. Apparently I'm 5'3" not 5'6". I made her measure twice.

Paul has no cavities. - and I have 2. There is no justice in dental hygiene.

Tobo has no teeth. - Apparently our ped was speaking freely when he said Tobo had teeth. My kindly dentist checked him out this morning at Paul's appointment and said, nope those are gum ridges, that's all. This is actually great news, because we don't have to worry about him swallowing them.

I'm down 3lbs. - Though I'm not following any "plan" I am trying to exercise once a day and watch what I eat. I hope to drop down a lot more weight, but it's a start.

The last couple of nights have been one long 2 hour sleep deprivation marathon, so today we are having a lazy day. Though I have much work to do before tuesday, I am just hanging out with Tobo in the sling:



he's also been in the swing, watching the window:



and generally being cute:

Look out Tobo! there's a monkey behind you!

We're signing off to hang out as a family since Paul just got home. Have a good weekend everyone!

Baptism

We'll be baptizing Sam on June 29th, 2008 at noon at Christ Church in Pensacola Florida. If you'll be in the area, we'd love to see you. It will be after the 10:30 am service in the chapel.

If you think you can make it, please drop us a line and let us know.

more doc visits and pics

Today I'm tired. But tobo has been doing all sorts of things, so I thought I'd update. The big thing was he slept straight through from 11p to 4:30a last night. I know this because I woke up ready at 2:30a... then again a 3a. Eventually I broke down and woke him up at 4:30 just to make sure he was ok. He also didn't eat as much last night as he has before, so we might finally be seeing his day/night side to something more normal. Other firsts, today he calmly hung out in the swing for minutes at a time. He hasn't been too hot on the swing before now.


We were back to the doctor on Monday to drop off paperwork for ACME and to check up on the rash of d00m. It is better, but the doc had hoped it would be further healed after 9 days of treatment. We got one more sample of vusion and a script for the current market standard for yeast infection/diaper rashes for when the sample runs out. This is how cool our doc is. He went digging around for one last sample for us because he was worried that it would not be covered by insurance and would run around $100 for a 5g tube. Apparently patients of his have had problems because it is new on the market. We'll check back next week hopefully with a clean bottom. If not, we start doing topical/oral antibiotics. hurrah.

We also went to my postpartum dr apt monday and I'm officially cleared for take off. Everything looks good and I'm basically back to where I started when I visited them in September. I'll miss being looked after by these people each month. They were excellent. I could only hope that my general practitioner was this good.

Speaking of which, both paul and I will be going in to him/her tomorrow. We're going through some last minutes hoops with ACME. In many ways there were not unseen, but we could use some prayers that our paper work, specifically our medical clearance, will be quickly presented and returned approved. This includes paperwork on Tobo as well. We weren't able to send it before this because of the pregnancy. We need to have all the pieces in to Singapore before the end of May. Anyway, please keep it mind.

In the middle of that, we went to see folks at my old place of work which was cool. I could get some freelance work there if I ask for it. I might take them up on it now that I can work from home. Tobo was a great traveler. This might be why he slept so good last night too. hmm...

He got a bath this morning finally, and has basically slept the day away in the sling. He actually kind of cried when I took him out of the moby, he was so comfortable. Hopefully tonight will go as smoothly.

Anyway, here are a few more pictures:
Snugglesaurus before church Sunday.


bopping in the carrier with dad. (he was happier when dad kept moving)