Where did this week go?

Well, Gabriel had a great birthday party.  We are so blessed to have so many friends and family that came to celebrate with us.  He was a little overwhelmed, but wandered around hugging all the kids multiple times while joining in on the badminton every once in awhile.  It turns out he was coming down with another cold, so had a reason for being a little loopy.  But all in all I think he had a blast, and figured out that all of the commotion was for him.  Our goal was to not have anybody get bored, so I hope we achieved success.  I have a few pictures, but am waiting for my Dad to send more before I post any.

I spent the week before the party continuing to do my Fall cleaning, trying to really spruce up every room in our house.  I lemon-oiled all the wood surfaces, cleaned the baseboards and doors, dusted and wiped down the ceiling fans, cleaned the plantation shutters and blinds, and shined up the kitchen really well.  That was all while he was at school Wednesday and Thursday.   Saturday I did regular housework and Sunday we were full throttle from sunup getting food ready, decorating and setting up all the stuff in the backyard.  We had to enlist our parents to help us (God bless 'em!) or we would not have gotten everything done in time.  And this was after careful planning for weeks!  Needless to say, we were completely exhausted Sunday night.  And I ended up with a cold, too.

Gabriel had a good 2-year check up, and made it to the 36" mark on height.  Jav's grandfather had a theory that as an adult, your height will be doubled whatever your height is when you turn two.  The theory rang true for Jav, his sister and cousins, and after I looked at my baby book, it's accurate for me too.  His checkup went well with only one concern about his speech.  He's not saying many words, and our doctor recommended seeing a speech therapist to get tips on helping him along.  I have been pretty concerned about it, because slow speech is one of the signs of autism.  But we filled out the questions regarding autism signs, and he doesn't have any other signs.  I think it's more about not having to say anything to always get what he wants.    Which will be a hard habit for the parents to break, but we will try.  

One really good thing that happened this week was that Gabriel is starting to get adjusted to his Day School.  It's hard when he only goes twice a week because he thinks we're not going back and then gets all upset again when we head that way.  When we left the house this week, he had what I call his "Kevin face", for all of you who have seen the movie Parenthood and love it like I do.    He was very worried from the moment we left the driveway, and started getting really upset about halfway there when his little sense of direction confirmed the worse:  We were heading back to THAT place.  I put my hand on his knee and started calmly telling him that it was ok to be away from Mama for awhile, and that he would have so much fun playing with the other kids and going outside and singing songs and working on art.  The little guy actually listened to me and did his best to put on a brave face, which made me feel even guiltier.  But when I picked him up, they said he'd had his happiest day ever.  And the next morning he actually walked into school instead of me having to carry him, and didn't get upset until I handed him over.  This was BIG for us, and I felt so much better about the whole thing afterwards.  We were considering pulling him back to one day a week, but I think we'll leave things alone for now.

Parenting can be such an internal battle at times. I want everything for my kid, but I don't want him to end up spoiled.  I want to push him to grow and learn, but I don't want to push so hard he feels like a failure.  I want him to experience all sorts of things, maybe even things I never got to try or do, but then I feel like I'm overwhelming him.  I think the best thing to do is just love him with patience, understanding and listening.  Listening to him and paying attention to my gut feeling about the right thing to do.