..my little boy..

my dear sweet finn,

oh my heavens, my dearest boy.....where to even begin?? as the days draw nearer when you will become a big brother, i find myself mourning the loss of you as my baby. don't get me wrong, i am so sooo excited to meet your little brother, and to add another precious boy to our family, but part of me feels guilty for taking away your "babyhood" so soon. in so many ways you are still a baby to me. a sweet, perfect, innocent, tiny baby. but then i look at pictures of you, and as i watch you throughout the day i can't help but realize you have become a little boy! you have such a distinct, darling personality. you are beginning to exert your independence (in more ways than one!). you are so smart, and bright, and in so many respects you aren't, in fact, a baby. you are a little boy.

as i think back to the days before you were born, i remember writing a post similar to this one about your big brothers. i was so beyond thrilled to meet you, and to have you in my arms rather than in my belly, but part of me felt so guilty about what your arrival would do to your big brothers. i remember crying hysterically about it quite often, and dad would always laugh and roll his eyes and say, "everything will be fine. duke and claus will love you just as much as they do now." and guess what?? dad was right! as much as our lives all changed when you got here, my love for duke and claus only grew. so i guess i'm not so much worried about what will happen with my love for you when sam gets here, i know i will always love you completely and unconditionally. but i am worried about what will happen with your love for me. :(

i know you are bound to have moments of jealousy, that is totally normal and to be expected. i know it is likely you will prefer dad over me for a while...but let's be honest, i'm used to that! ;) i know that as much as you'll grow to love your little brother, there will be times when you probably hit him and aren't so gentle with him and just want it to be me and you. i hope we can find a way to make it through the hard times, because there is no greater gift your dad and i can give to you than a little brother. i hope you two will grow to be the best of friends.

as scared as i am to see how you'll react to baby sam, your reaction is also one of the things i am most excited for. i so look forward to seeing you for the first time when you come visit us in the hospital, and i hope you'll at least indulge us for a few photos. i have a feeling they will be priceless. we have scheduled a date to be induced - october 11th. but i hope sammy comes before then, because i fear that i will have an emotional breakdown on the 10th as i put you to bed. your last night as an only child. i really don't think i'll be able to handle that! it would be much better for me if i didn't know when sam was going to get here, so let's keep our fingers crossed that he decides to come early! ;)

finn, i just want you to know how much i love you. i could never put the amount into words, and it is something you'll never understand until you have kids of your own. maybe not even then, because you're not a girl! but you have changed my life in so many ways. you make every day better for me, and at times when things are dark and gloomy, all i have to do is take a look at you - you are my light at the end of the tunnel, my rainbow on a rainy day, my knight in shining armor, my love, my life. i don't know how i ever lived without you, and i don't know what i would ever do without you. thank you for changing me....for making me a mommy. for being the sweetest, most handsome, smartest little boy i could ever dream of having. i love you more than you'll ever know.

love,
mom

..seventeen months old..

dear baby finn,

today you are 17 months old! let's just go ahead and say what we say every month...i can't believe how fast the time has gone! seriously, like, what did we even do this past month?? where on earth did the time go?? it boggles my mind.

i feel like you are in a stage of development right now where you learn things super fast and change a ton from week to week. it's so crazy how you just all the sudden pick things up, and we're like, "where did he learn that?!" you keep your dad and me on our toes pretty much all the time, and keep us laughing most of the day. you are so funny and smart, and i just absolutely love watching your personality develop. you are still the sweet, easy-going boy you've been from the beginning, and that is one of my favorite things about you. you are also a total ham, and have this goofy, hilarious side to you that i also adore. i wish i could just freeze time and keep you the way you are forever. :)

here are some things about you as a 17-month-old:

*you howl all the time, day and night. it is the funniest thing in the world. you picked it up from your brothers, who howl when an ambulance goes by or when they get really riled up by another day. as soon as i noticed you doing this, i started saying, "yes, that's what a werewolf says." so now we ask you, "finn, what does a werewolf say?" and you respond with "owwwwwww." SO funny.
*you're starting to talk more and more each day! you say mama, dada, grandma, nana, papa, duke and love bug. haha "love bug" is what i call dad, and one morning you and i were down in the kitchen, and dad was upstairs in our bedroom, so i yelled, "love bug." a few seconds later you yelled it. haha funniest thing ever!
*you wave from side to side instead of front to back and you wave at everyone and everything.
*you LOVE to jump! you figured out how to jump on the trampoline about a month ago, and i swear you could jump all day. just in the past week or two you figured out how to jump on solid ground, and you love to do that, too. it's so fun to watch.
*we've been trying to teach you the concept of "gentle," and you are getting better at it every week. about a month ago (maybe longer?) you started whacking us on the face, head, hitting your brothers, etc...i am sure it is just a phase, and i don't think you are intentionally being mean (okay, sometimes i think you are, haha) but with your baby brother on the way we figured we better hurry and teach you how to be soft and gentle. hopefully you'll have this mastered by next month. :)
*every morning, we bring you into our bed, where you drink your bottle and snuggle with us. a few weeks ago we decided to turn on "yo gabba gabba" after you were finished with your bottle, and surprisingly you like it! so now, when you are finished with your bottle you immediately reach for the remote controls, hand them to dad and say "uh," which means "please turn on yo gabba gabba." haha you'll watch for a few minutes at a time, sometimes more, and we love it because it means more sleepy time for us. ;)
*when you see us pull out our phones to take a picture of you, you pull the cheesiest face i've ever seen! haha it is so funny, and keeps us rolling on the ground.
*you've started climbing on everything, much to my dismay. tables, chairs, the barstool, our couches. i guess the only thing i don't like you climbing on are the tables. unfortunately, it's hard for you to differentiate what you can and can't climb on so i'm thinking this is going to be a long process of teaching you "no."
*you mimic almost everything we say and do, it cracks us up. for instance, the other day you were jumping on the trampoline with dad, and like a gross boy, dad spit over the edge. well, then you walked over and made a spitting sound over the edge! haha too funny. when we are done eating breakfast in the morning, i'll usually grab a paper towel and clean off the table. well, when i go to get you out of your highchair, you'll wipe off your tray. :) so cute. and i could go on with a million stories just like these. it is amazing what you pick up, and how much you learn. i guess we need to be careful about what we say/do in front of you! ;)

like i said, you are growing and changing and becoming this little human more and more every day. it is so weird to look at pictures of you from even just a few months ago, and see how much you have changed. you still have chubby little cheeks, but they aren't nearly as chubby as they were six months ago. you are no longer bald, your clothes are getting a little too small. you seriously are just turning into this boy, and it half breaks my heart, half makes my heart smile. it is definitely sad to see how fast this all happens, but at the same time i am so happy that you seem to be doing so well, and that you are such a happy little boy. i have been experiencing a wide range of emotions lately, and a lot of them stem from thoughts about what will change in our home when the baby comes. i have to keep reminding myself that giving you a baby brother is probably one of the best things we could ever do for you. i only hope that you'll like each other and form a bond early on that will carry you through all the years of your life. however, there are those negative voices in my head that worry that you won't feel loved or get the attention that you need and deserve. i know my love for you won't change, it will only continue to grow, but i don't know if you know that. i have heard that babies under 20 months don't go through the same "jealousy stage" that those over 20 months experience when a new sibling comes along. still, i am sure there is a learning curve, and i hope we can figure it out in record time. ;)

i love you more than you'll ever know, and i'm so happy you are mine.

love,
mom

..first visit from the tooth fairy..

dear finn,

well, we can probably set a record with this one.....17 months old and already had your first visit from the tooth fairy. :(

i knew she wouldn't forget about you, even with you being so small. rather than bringing you money, she brought you this cute book and this cool drum toy. you love the drum!

hopefully it will be a while before she has to visit again. ;)

today your mouth is pretty dang swollen, and it is turning black and blue. this is a good sign, though, according to the dentist. it means your mouth is healing the way it is supposed to. we will continue to keep our fingers crossed that your mouth doesn't scar and that everything heals properly.

love you dear boy!

love,
mom

..WORST day EVER..

dear baby finn,

my dear sweet boy, i don't even know how to begin this post. i am still so traumatized by what happened to you, that i don't know if i'll be able to coherently write about the experience. truth be told, i'd rather just forget about it forever, however i know that down the road we'll want an account of what happened. so here we go.........

today was a day like any other. we were still in our pajamas, un-showered, teeth un-brushed (at noon, mind you! hey, don't judge haha), just hanging out in the backyard. i was sitting at the table, you were riding your 4-wheeler. i will shamefully admit that i had this fleeting thought, "it would be terrible if he rode over the curb," but you had ridden your 4-wheeler so many times before and never really gone near the curb that i didn't think too much more about it. two seconds later (literally) over the curb you went, over your 4-wheeler, face-planting into the red lantern i had sitting by the door. it's probably hard to imagine unless you are familiar with our back patio. anyway, my heart immediately sank as i jumped up to help you. crying worse than i'd ever heard you with blood gushing out of your mouth, it was probably one of the worst images of you i've ever had, and of course it is now burned into my brain.

i picked you up, and something instantly fell out of your mouth - your tooth. a molar, no less, root and all. this explained the bleeding. luckily your head seemed to be okay, but you were crying so loud and hard (obviously, i mean, your tooth just came all the way out) that i didn't know what to do. so i called dad, but i was such a hysterical mess that he couldn't understand anything i was saying! so i tried as hard as i could to take a deep breath and calm down. i told him what happened and he said, "well take him to the hospital!" so frantically i gathered up your tooth and headed out the door, still balling my eyes out. as luck would have it, one of my tires was flat, and dad had instructed me earlier not to drive it anywhere, but this seemed like it was an exception. so i buckled you into your carseat and headed out the driveway. just as i was about to pull away, jessica came running out her back door and asked if i wanted her to drive us. so she jumped in the drivers seat and suggested we go to instacare. i am so grateful she came to the rescue, because she definitely helped calm me down.

you calmed down, too, on the way there. your mouth stopped bleeding so profusely, and you pretty much stopped crying. the wait time at instacare was considerably less than the last time we went, although i felt our visit was a little pointless because the doctor didn't say much. he checked all your vitals and ruled out concussion/head trauma, so i guess for that reason alone it was worth it to go. but he didn't know much about what would happen with your tooth/mouth, and just recommended we take you to a dentist.

as we were checking out of instacare (paying, and such), i asked you what a werewolf says, and it cheered me up more than you'll ever know when you let out your darling "owwwwww." everyone around us started laughing, and the receptionist even asked for you to do it again! haha, it was pretty darn funny, and helped me know that you were okay, even if you were in tons of pain.

when we got home i tried feeding you, and surprisingly you ate. i was shocked! we played for a little bit, then i put you down for a nap. i called the pediatric dentist that jessica takes her kids to, to see if they thought you should come in today or if it would be okay to wait until tomorrow. the dentist wanted to see you right away, just to make sure that the tooth really did come all the way out and to make sure that your mouth was going to be okay. luckily dad was in bountiful and able to come home and drive us to the dentist (remember, my tire was flat). i went in to get you out of your crib, thinking you'd still be awake since i had only put you down 15 minutes earlier, but you were sound asleep. :( it broke my heart to have to wake you up.

the dentist office was clear in west valley, but the inside of it was really cute and fun, so i think it was worth the drive. :) after filling out all the paperwork, we went back to see the dentist, and all i can say is thank goodness dad was with us, because hearing you scream the way you did when dad and the dental technician pinned you down so the dentist could get a look in your mouth was a little too much for me. it was so sad, and i just felt so bad for you because you had already been through way too much today. the dentist was surprised by what a clean break the tooth made. he said he had never heard of anything like that happening before (an entire molar coming out). he wasn't too concerned about infection, and didn't even want us to come back for a follow-up appointment, so that's a good thing, i guess. they gave you a couple toys and sent us on our merry way.

looking back on this whole traumatic day, i realize how blessed we were/are, and how heavenly father's hand helped us out the whole way, from traumatizing beginning to end. things could have been so much worse. *rather than losing a tooth, you could have lost an eye or had a concussion. *rather than losing your back top molar (which no one can see), you could have lost a front tooth and looked a little silly for the next however-many-years until your permanent tooth came back in. *it was a miracle that dad answered the phone when i called him, and two more miracles that *danny answered his phone when dad called him, and that *jessica was home, her nanny was there watching her kids, so she was able to take us to instacare. *it was a huge blessing that dad was in bountiful, right when we needed to leave to make it to the dentist office before they closed. and another huge blessing that the dentist wasn't too concerned about your mouth. he did say that you had a huge cut on the inside of your mouth that could potentially scar, so we will just hope and pray that it doesn't, because the thought of your perfect little face scarring is just too much for me to think about.

words can't begin to express how terrifying this day was, my sweet boy. hopefully i'll look back on it, and realize that it wasn't as bad as i made it out to be, but for now, i am pretty traumatized. i feel so responsible, and feel so horrible that i didn't heed the prompting of the spirit when it told me to watch and make sure you didn't fall off that curb. i am so grateful that you are okay, and today was definitely one of those days where i was reminded what an angel of a boy i have. you were so unbelievably brave the entire day, and it definitely helped calm me down. i can't imagine how painful it would be to have a tooth yanked out like that, yet you've been pretty happy and content for most of the day. i feel so lucky and honored to call you my son, and know that i definitely don't deserve you. you are my pride and joy and i don't know what i would ever do without you.

love,
mom