Jury Duty 2010

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A friend of mine posted this link to a video recap of the case that I had served on as a juror in 2010.

I don’t think I’ve ever posted anything online about the fact I served on the jury for this case, or for any case, for that matter.  But, I did, and the experience was one I would never trade for anything, but would never want to repeat, either.  I gained a profound respect for the United States’ justice system during the course of the trial and will never listen to another news report about a big case the same way again.

There are a number of other impacts this experience had on my life, but suffice it to say, it was definitely life-changing.

Personality

baby, growing, personality

 I wonder what little man will be when he grows up.

Little man has been growing so fast!  We were just looking at video we’d taken of him at around 3 months old the other night and couldn’t believe the change a few months has made.  Not only that, we couldn’t believe how much his hair has grown!  We thought he had a lot of hair at 3 months old…it’s nothing compared to his hair now!  Look at those little curls on the sides of his head!

Lately, I’ve been trying to see into his little budding personality.  He’s a curious little fellow – but I think most babies are curious by nature.  It cracks us up to see him lean over to the side (and sometimes topple over doing so) to see who’s coming down the stairs, who’s talking, or where the noise he’s hearing is coming from.

Don’t you just love that thoughtful look?

Today, I was watching just how far his level of persistence towards a goal would take him.  We have a bunch of toys he plays with in a cardboard box; he loves the box probably more than the toys inside.  I hadn’t taken any toys out of the box, and set him down beside it, curious what he’d do with either the box or the toys.

He hasn’t quite gotten the hang of crawling yet – mostly, he just crawls backwards.  But in the past week, he’s figured out how to get up to a sitting position from his hands and knees and does a pretty good job of getting around that way.

Here’s the funny thing, though.  He was on his hands and knees, trying to reach a ball in the box.  He tried for a few minutes to get that ball, but it was just barely out of reach.  He was as close to the box as he could go, but his little arms just didn’t make it, not matter how much he tried.  If he knew how to crawl forwards, it probably would have helped – he really just needed to get up a little higher on his knees to reach that ball.  But after a few minutes of trying, he got into a sitting position and looked around for something else that would provide amusement.  He didn’t cry because he couldn’t get the toy he wanted; he just looked for something else to play with that he could access.  He did eventually end up back at the box, trying again for various toys, and, when he couldn’t get the ones he wanted, either getting something that was already out, or just getting one that he could reach.

It’s fascinating seeing these bits of personality in little man.  I can’t wait to see more and more of his personality as he grows older!

Clouds, Clouds, Go Away…

baby, blessings, summer, weather

So far, this summer, Seattle has not had very summery weather – at least, not consistently.  Prior to last weekend, there was an article going around indicating Seattle had experienced a full 78 minutes of temperatures above 85 Farenheit, and a little over 18 hours of 75+ temperatures.

Short summer.
Then, last weekend, it was sunny for three days – temperatures hit over 85 on Sunday, but it wasn’t so bad that we were dying at home.  I can do that kind of summer.
Then, Monday, we had rain and thunderstorms.
I started grumbling about it to myself – this summer weather is ridiculous!  Last summer, I’d been laid off in early July, and so I just decided to enjoy the summer…I remember it being a pretty nice summer, getting to hang out with my husband (frustrations about unemployment aside).  This summer, with a little baby boy, I was looking forward to walking around the neighborhood with him, letting him soak up some Vitamin D rather than having to give him the oral vitamins.  But it hasn’t happened as often as I’d like.
Then I realized if it were too hot, I’d be blogging about a desire for air conditioning and cooler temperatures…
So, I guess I’ll just be grateful we have a heater when we need one, a room air conditioner when we need one, and family on the other side of the state we can visit when we want more warmth and sunlight.  

Cruel, Cruel World of Teething

baby, teething

For the past couple of months, little man has been getting tired around 8pm and going to sleep around then.  He’ll wake up a few times throughout the night, but it’s been a fairly quick feed baby, he’s back asleep routine.

For the past couple of days, though, it’s been all chaos.  He wakes up early in the morning and won’t stay asleep unless a parent is by him.  Last night was the worst – he was tired at 8pm, but wouldn’t get to sleep until 11pm, and then woke up every 60 to 90 minutes throughout the night, staying awake at one point for an hour before going back to sleep.  I had seen more teeth starting to come in (he has two on top, two on bottom – I saw two more on top coming through), but this lack of sleep was the worst we’ve been through.  [For you mothers who routinely get no sleep…my hat’s off to you.  I don’t know how you do it!]
Tonight, little man was tired at the usual 8pm, but he was struggling to get to sleep again.  We knew he’d been teething the night before and had given him Orajel to help with the pain on his upper gums.
What we didn’t see was the bottom gums.
THE CHILD HAD ANOTHER TWO TEETH CUTTING THROUGH ON THE BOTTOM GUM!!!
THREE TEETH CUT THROUGH IN ONE NIGHT!!  No wonder he wasn’t staying asleep!  Poor child had a mother who just put the Orajel on the top gum and completely ignored the bottom gums, leaving him in pain all night long.  I only found out when I was massaging his gums with some dissolved teething tablets for tonight, knowing there was one more top tooth cutting through.  I felt like an absolutely horrible parent getting so frustrated with him last night between the waking, the crying, the whining, and the biting me when I tried to feed him.
In other news…little man still doesn’t like solid food.  We keep trying.  He keeps spitting it out and looking like we’re poisoning him.
Oh, the irony of it all!

Boring, meet Unboring.

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I decided to read one of my favorite books to Little Man last night: The Cat in the Hat.

As I read the story, I realized…I’m the fish.  Even as a kid, I remember reading the book and thinking that the fish had a good point.  Yup.  I was that boring kid.

And I’m that boring adult.

My husband, on the other hand, is the cat.  He makes life fun!  I could totally imagine him saying, “Look at me! Look at me! Look at me now!” as he bounced on a ball while balancing all sorts of weird things.

Then I read another favorite:  Green Eggs and Ham.

Again…my husband is Sam.  I’m the other dude who finally says, “Fine.  I’ll try it to prove I don’t like it, just quit bugging me!” and then says, “Hey!  I guess I like it after all!”

Sadly, my take-away from the two book was…I’m boring/risk-averse/boring.

I’m so glad I married the cat.

First Solid Food!

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Today marked the first day of bottle-training for the little man.

It ended with trying solid food, instead.  It’s only a couple of weeks earlier than our doctor recommended starting him on solids, but with upcoming schedules, we needed to find something he’d eat than didn’t require my presence!

First bite…not sure if he likes it or not.
With no baby spoons on hand, we started with a regular plastic spoon…

Guess that rice cereal isn’t too bad after all!
…and Rich got a 1/2 teaspoon measuring spoon to use.  Hey, at least it was small!
(Desperate times, stubborn mother determined it was either solids or a bottle for Little Man, desperate measures.)
He ate nearly 3/4 of the bowl of cereal!
(Well, okay…3/4 of the bowl of cereal was gone. Maybe 1/2 of that actually made it into his mouth.  Still, we figured it was pretty good for the first time!)

Cleaned up and smiling! HURRAY!

He’s Growing!

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If anything could be called constant in our lives, it would have to be…change.  I was just looking through pictures of our little man this evening, unbelieving at the changes in the past few months.  This last week, little man’s first tooth started popping through, poor guy.  His dad had teeth early; looks like little man is taking after his dad in more than just looks!  Unfortunately, I think little man also got my pain tolerance.  Thankfully, we’re learning the sound and associated moves with the, “OW! MY GUMS!” cry and can quickly get some teething stuff on his gums to help him out.  
I can’t believe we’ve gone from first tubby time in the sink to splashing around with kicks, grins, garbles, and laughter during tubby time in the tub.  From little cries to big cries.  From living life in 4-hour blocks, where sleep came for 3 hours and eating took the fourth hour to sleeping most of the night and taking 30 minutes to eat, change a diaper, and get back to sleep.  From eyes just roaming to focused, intent tracking!  And another this last week…learning he has hands!  He was sitting with Grandpa, staring at grandpa’s pens in his shirt pocket last night.  Grandpa got a pen out, got little man to hold it.  We watched as little man then stared at the pen in his hand and slowly started bringing it up to his mouth.  He had too much of the pen sticking above his hand the first few tries (pen hit the ear, then his face); when Grandpa pulled the pen down a bit, little man hit success!!  We cheered him and he grinned!  Thus starts a phase of grabbing and gnawing, but I am so proud of the little guy!
First Tubby Time — about 2 weeks old.

Blessing Day — about one month old.

Sitting in a mini rocking chair – about four months old!

LDS General Conference

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I love General Conference for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.  During conference, the leaders of the church address us, giving us messages we need to hear.  The topics usually include gospel basics, such as prayer, faith, and repentance.  This conference, though, I took away two big things: have more charity by doing more service for others; and nobody is immune to struggles in life.

One talk in particular really touched me and dealt more with being a better spouse.  Elder Richard G. Scott, one of the members of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, delivered the talk.  I had tears in my eyes for most of it.  He spoke about his wife (who passed away awhile ago) and his children, and the moments of joy he had from his marriage and from being a parent.  He said his wife had always been so kind and thoughtful, and left notes for him in his scriptures and other places she knew he’d find them.  He said she always put others first, and always prayed for opportunities to serve someone every day – a prayer he said was always answered.  That talk really inspired me.  I really felt a desire to be a kinder and more caring wife.  What was funny to me was hearing my husband refer to the talk as the “how to be a better husband” talk; I felt like it was a “how to be a better wife” talk!  I guess Elder Scott managed to reach both husbands and wives with his talk!

The other thing I found interesting from this conference was the fact that two speakers spoke on trials in life, and both quoted a previous church leader who basically said nobody is immune to struggling in life, but the joy after the trial outweighs the difficulty from the trial.  I really appreciated that, in part, because I’d just been reading talks from the October 2008 General Conference where speakers said the same thing!  Trials come, and trials go, but we always learn more, and we find greater joy afterwards, though it’s tough to remember that or feel that way in the middle of the trial.

My goals after conference: be kinder; be gentler; reach out in service to others more; and remember when there seems no end in sight for some difficulty, God is watching and helping, and, in the grand scheme of things, the present is pretty fleeting!

Little man’s musical tastes

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I love singing to little man.  Most of the time, he loves it, too.  However, recently, my choice of songs seem to have been hit and miss…

A couple weeks ago, I was singing an old LDS children’s song, “I Hope They Call Me On a Mission.”  I don’t know if it’s sung as much as when I was in primary (the LDS children’s Sunday School), but it’s an old favorite of mine.  For those not familiar, the lyrics to the first verse are:

I hope they call me on a mission
When I have grown a foot or two.
By then, I hope I will be ready
To teach and preach and work like missionaries do.

As I was nursing little man, I was looking through the LDS children’s song book, found this song, and started singing.  Suddenly, little man stopped nursing, looked at me, and starting pouting!  I chuckled, stopped singing, and he went back to nursing.  I started singing again, and, again, he stopped, looked at me, and got tears in his eyes!  I couldn’t believe it – he’d NEVER reacted like that to a song!  I called for Rich to come watch, because that’s what any parent would do…laugh at their child crying when a particular song is sung…  Little man had gone back to nursing while I wasn’t singing.  I explained to Rich what was going on, and tried singing the song one more time.  Sure enough — little man stopped nursing, looked at me, pouted, and started crying!

The curious part of me tried it again a few days later, just to see if he’d still react the same way — he didn’t.  I figure he warmed up to the idea of a mission later in life…

Another time, I was playing Frank Sinatra tunes on the piano and singing along…and he got fussy!  He’s become fussy before when I was playing — if I’m sight-reading and stumbling through a song a bit, he occasionally gets a little fussy until I get to a different song that goes a bit smoother.  But the Sinatra reaction was a bit surprising.  I switched to a little Nat King Cole, and he was happy!  He’s listened to Sinatra with daddy before, but I guess he just wasn’t in the mood for it that particular day!

Then last night, as I was rocking little man to sleep, I was humming various songs – LDS children’s songs and some LDS hymns.  I decided to actually sing some of the words to the songs, and little man stopped nursing, pouted, and got teary again!  I went back to humming, and he was content.  Of course, I was curious again what the trigger for the tears was…turns out it was the words – to any song!  As long as I hummed a tune, he was fine, but the moment I started singing the words to whatever I’d been humming, he started getting teary-eyed!  So he got hummed to instead of sung to…after I laughed at his pickiness, of course!