milestones

I went to a baby shower recently where we played a game to guess details of the mom-to-be when she was a baby (birth weight/length, which tooth was cut first, etc). It was a lot of fun to see the guesses compared with the facts, and it made me think how much we've missed with both of our kiddos.

Now, this isn't a "I'm so bummed" kind of post. I realize that we've missed a lot of things with our kids, and there is just some information that we will never know. Were they big babies or little babies? Were they fussy or calm? When did they cut their first teeth? What time were they born? Did they have any kind of birthday celebrations before they came to us? I wish we had that information, but it's enough for me to remember that a) the Lord knows and b) that their biological families know and hold those treasures.

I'm thankful for that, and I'm also thankful that in His grace, we get to experience other milestones... like the first visit from the toothfairy and a first birthday celebration....

TEETH

A few weeks ago, we were completely caught off guard to see that Suma had a wiggly tooth. And by "wiggly", I mean "about to fall out of her head" kind of loose. WHAT! Where did that come from? It was so out of nowhere! We waited for the weekend to be over and kept bribing her not to play with it until we could go to the dentist. So we took her to our regular dentist, who charged us $50 to tell us that she should see a pediatric dentist and that she probably got hit in the face with something because the surrounding 3 teeth are also loose. Hm, thanks(?)...

All the way home, I kept asking her questions to find out if she had hit her mouth - we hadn't heard any screaming to indicate that she'd taken a spill of that magnitude, so we really needed to know if that happened and she hadn't told us. It's easy to plant false memories in a preschooler when you ask too many or leading question like that, so I gave it up pretty quickly because it was obvious that she couldn't remember any significant falls. But still...really? How did that happen?

The Lord very graciously provided a dentist, who - along with his wife - have been involved with Andrew's ministry for a few years. He looked at her, took a few x-rays ("This is interesting")...took a few more ("let's see this again at a slightly different angle")...and a few more ("how old did you say she is?")... and voila! It turns out that she had not been hit with a baseball or slipped at the pool, as we incorrectly assumed, but that she has grown up teeth moving in! What's more, little Suma-shark has several teeth that are moving in - so we'll have some excitement around here over the next few months.

Whew - the trip to Dr. W made me feel better! Although, I have to say, I'd rather deal with a number of medical issues than look at a wiggling tooth for more than 2 seconds. My specific prayer was that it would fall out on it's own and that we (or rather, me!) wouldn't have to pull it. Eesh, what is it about wiggly teeth? I just can't... So for the next few days, we gave her tootsie-roll pops and apples and all kind of good things to help that tooth along.

About 2 days later, I was getting her ready for bed. One of her favorite pj shirts is a little hard to get on when her hair is styled, so after navigating around the larger poofs, I gave it a good tug. "Oh!" she said, "my shirt kinda hurt my tooth a little." As she reached up to make sure that it was still there, I saw a gap where the tooth had been. "Come look in the mirror," I told her, "and see what that shirt did to your tooth." She was pretty excited - until it started bleeding. Of course, blood makes any kid scream, so we cleaned that up (while trying to keep a very curious Ibra away so that it wouldn't scare him) and went to search for the tooth.

She put her tooth in a little box and woke up to find 2 dimes next to it in the morning. "Centae!" Her big tooth is now moving in, and we expect that it will be joined by its other friends soon. 

BIRTHDAY

We celebrated Ibra's birthday recently, which he had been looking forward to for months. One of the first things that my mom told him was that they would get him a bicycle for his birthday. That was last fall, and he asked about it every day since. 

We loved getting to celebrate the day with him! We decorated the house, let him pick out a present at a local bookstore and choose what to eat for dinner/dessert. He was so excited, and kept wondering when his bicycle would appear. He opened presents from family after dinner, and just when he had almost given up about the bike - he opened a helmet and training wheels. "What are these?" he asked. "Let's go outside and see what they might go with," my mom suggested.

We covered his eyes and walked outside. As we went outside, my brother casually mentioned to him, "Boy, I hope it doesn't lick you!" That threw Ibra for a loop! He started giggling and trying to hide behind me - just in case it was a dog (he later told me). But, of course, he opened his eyes to see a shiny new bike! He was so thrilled, he could hardly stand it! He has been riding it every day ("I have to practice, Mommy!"), and asked this morning if we could just take the training wheels off already. This is coming from the little boy who decided that he didn't need floaties after having gone swimming for only 2 weeks, so we'll have to see.

We are so thankful to celebrate these milestones with our kids, and we're excited for all of the ones yet to come! Our Lord is good. :)