Memorial Day

Today we spent some time at Hersheypark, and Judith had a blast!  We didn't do the water rides today since it was a little cool for that, and the water in the wave pool wouldn't have had a good chance to warm up yet haha.  She did get to ride on the kids' flume, and a few other rides, though!  I think it's going to be another year before she can start riding on a few more things, but for now she has a pretty good selection of rides that she can ride, either with us or on her own.

It was fun spending the day with my parents and my grandparents, and I know they all enjoyed watching Judith on the rides!  Something really neat happened to my grandfather today: he was wearing his Army hat (he's a Korean War veteran), and a group of teenage girls struck up a conversation with him about it while they were waiting in line to get ice cream, asking which war he served in, where he was stationed, etc.  One also gave him a hug!  He got his ice cream, and came over to us to sit down on a bench to eat, and the girls came over and wanted to talk to him more about it!  I thought it was so cool that they were interested in hearing his stories!

Easter 2013

Easter is one of my favorite holidays of the year.  The services throughout Holy Week are rich with tradition, as are the liturgies on Easter Sunday.  There is something glorious in the proclamation "Christ is risen, He is risen indeed!  Alleluia!", followed by the singing of the amazing hymns proclaiming Christ's victory over the grave.  The one thing I missed this year (and last year, for that matter) was playing with the brass ensemble to accompany the liturgy.  Ah well, there's always next year!

We started our Easter celebration a little early by participating in the church egg hunt Saturday morning.  This was Judith's first year searching for eggs, and she actually did really well (and got a really nice haul!).  This year there was an extra bonus, as one of the members brought a bunch of her show rabbits for the kids to look at and pet.  Judith spied a beautiful brown bunny when we went inside the church, and immediately called it a "doggie" (the rabbit was on a harness, so I think that's where the association came from).  Once she realized it was a rabbit, she kept saying "hop hop!"

I felt a little sad that evening, because it was the first year in a long time that I didn't attend Easter Vigil services.  I took Judith last year, and it was a nightmare because she did not want to be in the sanctuary and was an overtired, cranky mess.  I told John that there was no way I was going to tempt fate this year, and decided to keep her home so we could observe a normal bed time.  I made up for it, though, by watching the masses from the Vatican and the basilica in Washington, DC.

Easter Sunday was not a chaotic mess for once.  John had to get up early for the sunrise service (his last one, thank goodness), but Judith and I were able to take our time getting ready since we planned to take separate cars so Judith would only have to sit through 1 service and would still be able to fit in all of her extra vest and breathing treatments that she needs right now.  I was bummed because I didn't have a voice and couldn't sing the hymns, but otherwise it was the service I expected it to be.

After church, my parents came to our house for Easter lunch.  We placed some eggs in the front yard for Judith to hunt, and she found and sifted through her Easter baskets.  I was impressed that she didn't melt down too much toward the end of the day, considering it was somewhat busy with a lot of stimulation.

Christmas Time Is Here

The last 2 days have been exhausting, and battling to try and get the bactrum into Judith didn't help our stress levels, but we still had a good time and made some good memories as a family.

Christmas eve was more insane this year than it was last year.  Judith and I hung out at her godparents' house during the first service, and then we joined John at the church for the 2nd service.  We took some pictures before the Youth Chime Choir had to rehearse, and I was pleased that I got a good Daddy/Daughter shot:

I was surprised that Judith didn't fall asleep during the service, even though she was clearly tired.  She stayed awake through the whole thing, and overall was well behaved.  Once we took her back to her godparents' place and got her into her jammies, she fell asleep and stayed asleep until we were done with the last service and went to pick her up.

Earlier in the day, I was worrying about the weather because they were calling for some mixed precip to fall during the evening and into the night.  While we did get a bit of sleet, it was mostly snow and regular rain, and travel wasn't too hazardous for us.  The end result was a very pleasant surprise: we ended up with about an inch and a half of snow, and woke up to a winter wonderland on Christmas morning!

Judith was kind to us and slept until 7:30.  I would've loved for her to have slept longer since John & I didn't get to sleep until 2, but at least we got 5 hours in, and that's better than nothing.  I made cinnamon rolls and hot chocolate for breakfast, which is something I'd like to turn into a tradition.  Judith was playing and running around the living room with pieces of her Nativity set; she grabbed baby Jesus, and correctly told us who it was:

Buster and Lady were relaxing along with us (Lady was actually taking a break from chasing the pieces of Judith's Nativity set), and were eagerly waiting for breakfast to be made so they could catch a few handouts:

After breakfast, we opened presents.  Judith was able to open most things on her own this year, but she still didn't quite get the whole concept.  I think in another year she'll really get it.  In any case, she was a very delicate unwrapper this year, and would pull small shreds of paper off her gifts then hand them to us.  Silly girl.

Hugs for her new stuffed Minnie and Mickey!

After presents we squeezed in her morning Vest treatment, then headed to my parents' and grandparents' places to do the gift exchanges with them.  Judith got a lot of neat things, including a stuffed Daisy:

Now we have half of the Mickey Mouse Clubhouse characters in our house.

Green tinsel garland makes a fabulous boa

My mom made Christmas dinner this year.  I feel bad because Judith barely touched the food, even though it was things we know she likes.  I'm hoping that by next Christmas, she'll have grown out of this picky phase.  Anyway, after dinner we had 2 more rounds of presents.  By this time, Judith was starting to lose interest in the whole thing, and didn't really want to nap, either.  We ended up helping her open most of her stuff because she was basically done and more interested in pulling the candy canes off my parents' tree:

I felt bad that things were a little rushed at the end, but we knew we had to get her home and put her to bed.  It was for the better, because both John & I were exhausted, and my parents were pretty tired after having to do so much at their church the night before.

Overall, it was a good holiday, but we can't wait for next year when she'll hopefully be more into the whole season.

Happy Easter!

Out of all of the seasons of the church year, Easter is by far my favorite.  Speaking the proclamation "Christ is risen!  He is risen indeed!  Alleluia!" has always been special, and in a way magical.  This year, though, those words feel even more special.  Realistically, we know the odds of Judith outliving us like any child should are very low.  We know that, because of her CF, death looms much closer.  However, that small proclamation reminds me that no matter what happens to Judith, she will be well cared for because of the promises of the resurrection.

But enough of my deep, brooding thoughts.

I love attending services at this time of year, and I can't wait until Judith is older and can appreciate (heck, more like can actually sit through!) the entire Triduum.  Last year I took her to Maundy Thursday services, because let's face it: she was still sleeping all.the.time. We had zero issues.  She was ok last year during Easter Vigil, but had a meltdown when she heard me chanting and I wasn't with her (she calmed down once I was able to go back to her).  This year, I didn't take her to Maundy Thursday because I knew Vigil would be a battle - thanks to the "raging success" (/sarcasm) we had on Ash Wednesday, I would've been happy if she made it through half of the service.  Ha!  She barely lasted through 1/4 of it.  Oh well - she's still too young, and it doesn't help that evening services coincide with bedtime.  Needless to say, she didn't get to sleep until almost 9:30, 2 hours after her normal bedtime.

That made for an exciting 5:15 am wakeup call this morning for sunrise service.  Oh, and she barely slept in the car on the way to the church, and thought it would be an awesome idea to take only a 20 minute nap between 6:15 and 12:30.  Really though, I may complain, but she was pretty darn good considering all of this!

We spent some time this afternoon with my side of the family, sans my dad - long story short, we've been worried and stressed because he was admitted to the hospital about a week and a half ago, but thankfully will be coming home tomorrow (provided everything goes smoothly!).  It felt awkward without dad here, and I missed having him here.  We did have a nice dinner though, Judith made out like a bandit with her basket goodies, we had a small egg hunt in the yard (and realized that Judith still hates grass), and just enjoyed the time together.

Naturally I can't make a post about a big holiday without some pictures.  For your viewing pleasure:

T-Minus 6 Days

It's officially less than a week until Judith is 1.  Less than a week before I no longer have a baby, but a toddler.

Things have been insane around here since Thanksgiving.  We had a great holiday - the Wednesday before we spent the night at my parents' house, and went to church in the evening.  My "other" church hosted the conference-turned-semi-community service, and I played with the brass group (that's the 2nd time in about a month that my trombone has been played, and it's still trying to figure out what hit it - thank goodness it didn't shrivel up once it saw the light of day!).  Thursday John, Judith, & I drove to see John's parents and one of his brothers, and we had breakfast with them.  Turkey dinner was later that day, with my parents and grandmother.

Judith had her first tastes of some Thanksgiving foods, minus the turkey; she doesn't handle meats well, and I'm honestly waiting until she has more teeth (I'd ideally like to hold off until she has molars, based off of some good advice I was given a while back) before really trying meats with her.  Despite the meatless meal, Judith really enjoyed herself!  Mashed potatoes were an especially big hit:

We even put some gravy on them, figuring it would be a good high-calorie option for her.  She didn't seem to be a big fan.  Silly kid.

The rest of the weekend was spent shopping and preparing some things for Judith's upcoming birthday and party.  We have our paper goods & decorations, and yesterday I finished her pictures for our photo wall.  I feel a thousand times better knowing this is done!  I need to find my Pampered Chef easy decorator and wash it so it's ready to go for cupcake decoration, and there are a few small loose ends that we'll need to take care of, but otherwise we're in good shape!


We have another CF Clinic appointment, and it will be the first one with Judith's new doctor.  I have a big list of questions I'm taking with me this time, and hopefully we can get some answers.  I'm so curious to see how long she is, and how much she weighs!  Next week she'll have her 1 year well-baby visit with her regular pediatrician, and that means shots.  I'm seriously contemplating delaying one of them until her 15 month appointment since she's getting her Synagis injections at this appointment as well - I don't want to stick her too many times, and I'm wary of overloading her system too much.  Load these appointments on top of crazy rehearsal schedules to get ready for building dedication at my "other" church, PT changes (since we'll be at clinic during her normal therapy time), and general holiday preparations, I may go nuts.

I am excited that Judith has a new tooth!  Her upper front left tooth made an appearance over the holiday, and it's steadily working its way through her gum.  It'll be a while before it's fully in, but at least it cut through.  She's still teething like crazy though, and there are at least 2-3 other teeth lined up, preparing to come out.  I'm not surprised that she's cutting a bunch at once, but she's also been super cranky because of it - these teeth had better come out quickly for everyone's sake!

Halloween Eye Exam

It's Judith's first Halloween today, so how do we celebrate?  With a follow-up appointment to the opthamologist!

In a previous post, I mentioned that we were monitoring Judith for strabismus.  Much to our relief, it turns out she has pseudostrabismus: it may look like her eyes are crossing, but they really aren't.  It has a lot to do with her facial structure, and as she grows it should go away.

We also learned that we can hold off on getting her glasses for at least another 3 months.  The doctor doesn't think it's necessary to give her glasses right now, but we are closely monitoring how Judith does with the farsightedness.  It's inevitable that she'll end up with glasses in the near future, but I'm hoping to hold off as long as possible in the hopes that it'll be a bit easier to teach her not to rip them off her face when she's older.


Judith didn't go Trick or Treating this year - I thought it would be a bit silly to take her around, and there would only be 2 places we'd go to anyway (our neighbors on either side).  Plus I feel bad getting candy for her when she can't eat it.  That probably sounds completely silly.  Anyway, we did dress her up in her costume for her appointment, and managed to snap a picture of her with the dogs in their costumes:

L to R: Buster (cow, or "Boo Cow"), Judith (pumpkin), Lady (unicorn)

Happy Halloween!