Popsicle

Okay my son is going to kill me when he gets older because of this video, but who cares that's a long ways off. So today I headed over to my parents' house after speech therapy to give them a chance to hang out with Jacob for awhile. Mom hasn't really had a chance to be around him much since she just got out of the hospital not too long ago. She is finally feeling better and was able to really enjoy being with him and playing. It was such a nice day outside that we decided to hang out on their back porch and get a little sun and shade in with a nice breeze. Dad figured it was a good thing to go ahead and give the dogs a bath because they kind of smelled a little funny after being in the kennel for a week. Afterwards, we all had popsicles to cool us off. Jacob loves popsicles, but hasn't quit mastered the art of how to eat them. They are kind of cold on his teeth and I think they give him brain freeze, but still he shoves them in his mouth. We striped him down to his diaper and straped him in the highchair and let he go at it. Once he was finally done, he was an absolute mess of stickiness, but still adorable. Mom suggested that I give him a full bath, but I just wasn't in the mood to do that at 2:30pm in the afternoon. So I got the brillant idea from my dad that we should just hose him off in the backyard. The water wasn't too hot or too cold, but just perfect. He loved it. I practically had to pry him of the iron bars to get him dry. It was so cute that we had to get it on video tape. Enjoy!!!

How my morning routine has changed in 8 months

Before we had Jacob we knew , from family , friends, and the glaring obvious , that our lives would never be the same. With that said I just never knew I would be sitting at my desk on a Friday afternoon humming the theme to "Shaun the Sheep"! Don't get me wrong I am a fan of the show. Jacob and I usually get an hour in the morning together before Rebecca gets out of bed and we have a fairly consistent routine now. We drink our milk for 10-15 minutes in what seems is the only time of the day he will sit still for a period of time, then we are off to the races. First we empty the toy bin in the living room that mommy and daddy just got through organzing, once we have spread every toy out in the living room (which takes no longer than 5-10 minutes itself) , we then move on for daddy's attention and wrestles the sports page out daddy's hands with one hand and grabs for his cup of coffee from the coffee table with the other hand. Once we have shredded daddy's newspaper to a unreadable crumbled mess we move to the TV stand and start banging on the DVD Player, Daddy's Playstation, the VCR and grab for any wires within our grasp. At this point in time I usally tell Jake "No" and he will then proceed to cry for 5 seconds before becoming distracted by the DVD/VCR Tape Rack . He then moves for that at lighting quick speed and pulls every "Field of Dreams" "Full Metal Jacket" and Pilates exercise DVD/Tape off the rack and throws it on the floor. Once the living room is completely wrecked he will move on to terriozing the dogs. Brodie and Seven could not be any better with the way they behave around Jacob but to their credit they have learned to stay out of his way. Jacob usally spots a dog lounging on the floor from across the room and if he is interested will pounce on them like a cheetah hunting a gazelle. If quick enough he will pull their tail or grab a handfull of their coat and laugh as the dogs just look back at me with a "How long are you going to let this kid stay in our house?" gaze. The dogs now have caught on and when they see the cheetah coming they leave the room for the saftey of the grassland praires (our closet). By this time its usally 6:45am or 6:50am , this is the time for the "Hot Dog Song" on Disney's Mickey Mouse Clubhouse. Jacob loves this song and it's worthy of it's own post in due time. So we sit there for a minute or two that the hot dog song is rocking out and Jacob stares with amazement. Once the song is over it's back to toys, dogs, and living room demolishment. At this time I am out of breath and begging to get into the office to take on something less physical like dealing with an IRS Auditor and working up a Statement of Grounds on a Sales Tax Redetemination for my clients. However before I get that that I usally catch the 5 minute interlude between cartoons on the Disney Channel which features "Shaun the Sheep"at this time. Dont get me wrong, I would not trade this new morning routine for anything on earth but it is exhausting chasing after an 8 month old with a mission. I absolutly adore, respect, and cherish Rebecca for her ablity to handle him for 10-12 hours a day , 7 days a week as it is no easy task. And when Jake gives us that great big smile and laugh it makes our day. For those of you that have not had the opportunity to hum the theme to "Shaun the Sheep" at your desk, enjoy:

Mom's Surgery

Hey everyone if you want to get an update on my mom's surgery and recovery check out her blog at www.the-jacob-house.blogspot.com You can also find the link to the right side of my blog. I will keep updating it daily.

First Mother's Day

It was my first official Mother's Day this year. I was about 5 months pregnant last year anxiously awaiting to meet our new bundle of joy. And boy is he. It was such an awesome day. Vince let me sleep in a little while he took care of Jacob in the morning. It is such a treat to always get a few hours of extra rest. Once we all got up and going, we headed over to pick up Nana Rita for lunch. We had a wonderful lunch outside and took some pictures. Jacob really enjoyed himself and behaved very well the entire time. He kept looking at the table next to us and talking out loud. I guess he figured everyone needed to know what he had to say. I am so blessed to have such a wonderful little boy. I couldn't imagine my life without him or what my life would be like if he was never around. He is the most precious gift I could have ever received and I thank my lucky stars that I have him. He is the cutest and most adorable little thing I have ever witnessed. He cracks me up all the time and always keeps me on my toes. I love you Boo Bear!!!

My favorite thing to do

We have all heard the famous quote, "Never wake a sleeping baby!" But lately it has become one of my favorite things to do with Jacob. I usually start getting ready for bed around 9 or 9:30 at night. I brush my teeth, wash my face and change my clothes, if I am not already in my pj's. Then I will sneek into Jacob's room and pick him up out of his crib. He will usually wake up for a minute or two, but will then fall back asleep in my arms. We sit in the rocker and listen to music while I hold him and cuddle. If any of you know my child he doesn't sit for very long and is off to the next big adventure. So this is my time to be close to him and let him know how much I love him. He so sweet when he is sleeping and I swear I can actually tell what he is dreaming about. Sometimes he will make whimpering sounds, like he is chasing after mommy, daddy and the dogs. When he is awake he is always trying to attach us. This is such a precious time in his life that I always want to remember, so I try to take the time when I can because it is always so crazy around here that I don't want to miss a moment. I want to look back on our time together and know that I spent every chance I could to be with him, awake and sleeping.

Get that hearing aid out of your mouth!!

When Jacob first got fitted for hearing aids we read accounts from other parents and heard from our Doctors that the children will put their hearing aids in their mouth or take them off all together all of the time. For his first 3 or so months of wearing the aids this was not a problem at all , lately however is a different story. This son of ours constantly has the hearing aids in his mouth sucking on them. We have bought one of the hearing aids and the other is a loaner from Cooks as we are still not sure if he will need aids long term or if we might go down another path for his hearing. It is to the point now where we leave the room for 2 minutes and come back and he has one or both in his mouth slobbering all over this $1500 piece of equipment. We had to send the loaner aid back to Cooks for some repairs as he gunked up the aid so bad. Fortunately we have not lost an aid or he has not damaged them to the point of no return. However the constant struggle with this child to keep on this gets tiresome. Therefore we are to the point of covering the aids in a "Nail No Bite" type product that tastes terrible and might deter him for sucking on these. Our other option would be to have him fitted for a football helmet so he can't get to his ears.

Photo shoot

Today we took Jacob over to Picture People to get some cute photos of him. He did such a good job. Sometimes he smiled and other times he had really thoughtful look on his face. We got so many good shots of him and the family. Here are a couple of our favorites.

Easter 2009

Vince and I started the day off at church at St. Patrick's Cathedral downtown in Fort Worth. We got there extra early because you never know how many people are going to show up for mass. It never fails that the two holidays people always attend church service for is Christmas and Easter. We ended up getting a whole pew to ourselves so we were able to keep Jacob pretty much entertained the whole time. He really does well during mass, but usually by the end he has had enough and is ready to either eat a meal or take a nap. Afterwards we headed over to my parents' home for Easter lunch. My mom had taken the time to put out the huge Easter eggs for Jacob to play with. These things are enormous. They are literally about 12 inches each egg. Oh and there were of course Easter carrots too!!! We had a great lunch with all of the family and even Jacob participated. Mom and I kept feeding him table scraps like potatoes and bread. I had even made some Easter cupcakes and we thought it would be funny to watch Jacob demolish one. Take a look at the second photo and see for yourself what became of the cupcake. He had it everywhere. And of course we got a full bath afterward. He had all between his fingers, his hair, up his nose and even some in his ears. He was a complete mess. Gotta love that kid. After we all had lunch and had cleaned up the Jacob mess, we played a little with all the gifts the Easter Bunny had brought. It was such an awesome day. Hopefully next year it won't run interference with the dreaded "TAX DEADLINE"!!! And maybe Daddy will be able to relax a little more and not have to run back home to finish tax returns.

Isn't he just the cutest little bunny you have ever seen? I know I'm a little biased.

Look at the messy face!

After bath time. He is such a hill billy baby. All he had on was a bib and a diaper. We had to wash and dry his clothes while he took a nap.

Easter Bunny

Today my mom and I went grocery shopping at Carswell Airforce Base in Fort Worth for Easter brunch. We spent the whole day running around with Jacob and he was so well behaved. He cried a few times, but that's typical for him. While we were out we stopped by the BX to look at some things for Jacob in the baby department. Afterward we went and paid for our items. While we were in line the cashier had told us that the Easter Bunny was in the Food Court and we should stop byfor a visit. So we headed over. There weren't any other babies or kids at the time because it was around 2pm on a Thursday afternoon. So it was perfect. While I was with the photographer deciding which package of pictures to purchase, my mom and Jacob hung out with the Easter Bunny. It was hilarious. The Easter Bunny had Jacob cracking up and giggling the whole time, it was perfect. Usually we get a few good pictures of Jacob looking up and smiling, but this time I actually had a hard time deciding which one to purchase because they were all so good. He was having a blast. Take a look how cute my Boo Boo Bear is!!! I just love him.

7 Months

The Easter Bunny

Have not posted pictures in a while so here we go. Today we took the family down to TCU as they were having an Easter Egg Hunt and the Easter Bunny for Pictures. We were afraid that the weather would not cooperate as the wind was howling when we woke up this morning but it turned out to be a great day. We got plenty of good pictures with the family, Mrs. Easter Bunny and SuperFrog. Check out a few pictures of our day at TCU:

Maybe next year we can partake in the actual easter egg hunt!

No more hair!!!

This is what happens when you shave a 40 lbs. lab mix. His head and ears get really big and he has a boney rat body. He looks so funny, but I don't care because all the shedding hair finally gone for at least a little bit.

6 months old

I know this is a little late, but I still have to post a picture of my baby. He turned 6 months on 3-6-2009. He is up to so much. He won't stand still for a second. He loves to crawl all around the house and is now learning to pull up on things, like the coffee table, fireplace and sofa. Watch out world because Jacob is getting ready to walk!!!

One test down, Two to go...

We are well on our way to meeting our PPO's deductible before we get out of the first quarter here in 2009. Jake had had his ABR (Auditory Brainstem Response Test) on Tuesday and tomorrow he will undergo an MRI and next week is a P1 Latency Test. The ABR is the same test he had at 6 weeks that told us initially we had some issues, this test basically measures how his brain responds to certain level of sounds. This does not tell us whether the sound he is hearing has clarity or if he can properly hear the sound but only that his brain is responding when levels of sound are input. The MRI will check to make sure the wiring (cochlea, auditory nerve, etc...) are formed properly and our issue does not lie with that avenue, which we are almost positive it's not. The P1 Latency Test will measure Jake's response time to understanding and interperting certain Ticket lingo & drops (inside joke for all you P1's). In all seriousness the Latency Test is going to tell us more about where he is at than any of the other tests. It will tell us the response time in which sound is being captured by his brain, and I think might tell us of the clarity but don't quote me on that because I did not go to medical school! Back to Tuesday's ABR, he did well. When he took the ABR at 6 weeks the lowest level of sound they could see his brain responding to was 65 decibels, this is about the level of a normal conversations. On Tuesday they got a response down to 20 decibels which is about the sound a mosquito when buzzing by ya. This is a nice improvement and perhaps shows his auditory nerve is progressing. Again the ABR does not tell us the clarity of the sound so we could still have an issue there but the Latency Test next week will give us more information to work with on that angle. The ABR and tomorrows MRI both require him to be sedated which kind of sucks to see little man go under like that. Rebecca held him while they administered a suppository to put him under for the ABR. With the way this boy goes through diapers its a wonder the medicine ever had a chance to work. After the test we got to go see him in recovery and he was glassy eyed and stretched out on a bed . When he saw Rebecca and I he gave this drunken smile nod as if to say "This is some Good Stuff, you guys got any peaches I'm hungry!". Lets see what we find out on tomorrows MRI, 1 down 2 to go!

Hearing Tests

Okay for some of you that don't know this, but our son Jacob was diagnosed at birth with a hearing impairment. We have been working really hard these past few months on his speech and language development and getting him to listening to noises. He has been doing really great and we have had a lot of success with him. Tomorrow and the next couple of weeks will be a little rough on Vince and myself because Jacob will be going through some more hearing tests. It's all standard procedure, but none the less it's still a little nerve racking. We ask that you keep Jacob in your prayers that he will pass all of these tests with flying colors because it will show how much his brain and nerve have matured over the past few months. The more they mature, the better the chance he won't have to have implants when he gets older. So if you pray every day like I do, remember to add Jacob to your list.