the state we're in

I’m a little late with this which makes it difficult to remember exactly what happened in his eighth month, but I would say Conley’s most remarkable development is that he’s become a proficient crawler!  We watched him for days thinking, “For sure, this is the day!”  But when he was good and ready, he took off and hasn’t stopped.  I knew we were in trouble when I left him in the living room one day when I was mopping, then turned the corner into the kitchen and found him sitting there with Maeby’s food bowl in his lap.  Oops!  Operation Baby Proofing to commence stat!

 

If his seventh month was a bit trying, his eighth month was a dream.  Upon the encouragement of a friend, we finally decided to wean Conley from his snug double swaddle.  Combined with the middle of the night wake-ups we were struggling with, that sounds like a crazy idea in hindsight, but miraculously, we had precisely one night of CIO (if you don’t know what that means, I don’t want to talk about it) and then it was back to a full night’s sleep for all of us—swaddle-free (we still use the woombie, but arms-free, and just for warmth)!!  If you could have seen the clouds part and heard the angels sing when we retired the Miracle Blanket—it was a thing of beauty.  We were truly convinced that C would be asking his roommate to help him with his swaddle in college.  I’m not sure I can overstate how elated we were/are!  Bedtime has become much less stressful around here, and his reliable 11-12 hour nights are so sweet.  As an added bonus, he’s also resumed his incredibly reasonable 7:30 – 8:00 wake-ups in the mornings.  Bliss!

Conley is doing great in the nursery on Sunday and Thursday mornings.  The sweet, baby-whisperer ladies who take care of him tell me how much he loves playing with the other babies (they’re surprised he’s an “only”) and that he basically eats the whole time he’s there, since that’s the only way he’ll tolerate the other kids eating around him.  He’s still on a 4 hour schedule with 4 nursings/day and 3 solid meals/day.  He’s doing really well as he’s become more and more flexible staying awake for 2 – 2.5 hours at a stretch and (sometimes) taking 1.5 – 2 hour naps.  We still have our days of nap struggles, but I try to remember how much he’s improved.

 

Still, sometimes I wonder when I’ll be able to roll with Conley’s punches with a little more grace.  To be quite frank, I do more cursing than I’ve done my whole life (including those cringe-worthy middle school years) and probably more praying, too.  I’ve always heard that marriage is like holding a mirror up to your sin; no one prepared me for the ugly reflection I would see staring back at me in the uncomfortably lucid mirror of motherhood.  Ouch.  In my wiser moments, I’m grateful to God for this glorious and painful process of refining my heart.

This month, we celebrated Nala’s (Kendrick’s mom) birthday, mimed our way through Halloween, and dressed up for our parent dedication at church.  The verse of dedication we chose for Conley is 1 Corinthians 10:31: "So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God."  I pray daily that he’ll come to embrace that heart goal early in life.  As Kendrick said at the dedication, I pray that we would model a faith that would make it an easy step for Conley to put his trust in Christ.  And I pray prayers of thanksgiving for the wonderful support team we have all around us, helping us press on in this goal.

 

A few outtakes from our photo session.  We go through many photos of him standing, wiping out, and hanging over the edge of the chair to get one good shot of him smiling at the camera.  But I love the way these show the personality of our never-still boy who makes everything his jungle gym.  I also stay busy praying prayers of protection over his life.   I love you too much, Sweet C.