Micah's Second Month

Aunt Elisa and Cousin Ava Came to Visit!

Unbearably Cute

Micah Thomas Sutherlun

He missed his first Christmas, but we joyfully welcomed Micah Thomas on December 27, 2011 at 8:44 p.m. He was 19 inches long and 7 lbs, 7 oz. Blue eyes, blond hair. We think he looks like a distinct combination from within our admittedly limited gene pool, but speculate that he looks the most like Asher, minus some of the cheeks :). You can judge for yourself:

With the arrival of your 4th child, you definitely don't get the "life has changed forever" feeling that you get with the first, but life has altered in some recognizable ways in the last week.

1. The males have gained a 2/3 majority in the household. Serena and I are undaunted by this.

2. Our family of 6 officially cannot ride together in our Toyota Corolla. This makes it something of an "escape car" for the parent who gets to drive it :). If you're driving the Toyota for the day, you aren't with the kids, at least not all of them.

3. If Serena and Asher are calling Micah "the new baby," little Josiah must, at 15 months, be "the old baby." And I do find myself less concerned about his general welfare - he seems awfully big and sturdy compared to Micah and he's had over a year to adapt to surviving his siblings' attention/affection/ harassment.

4. Once again, as it's been with each newborn, "I kept the baby fed and the other children alive" is, at the end of the day, a statement of enormous accomplishment.

5. An uninterrupted night's sleep is a distant memory. Oh, wait, that's been true for 5 1/2 years....

In other ways, life hasn't changed at all. We begin 2012 inconceivably blessed by the God who gives life and entrusts us with unbelievably good gifts. I pray we will be faithful stewards.

Blogging with Four, an apology of sorts

It seems indicative of the current season of my life that the last post on this blog (3 months ago) was an "obligatory one" - by that I mean that you cannot skip the birthday update if you want to feel (or appear) at all like a proud, doting parent :) - and the next blog post will also be an obligatory one (and joyful, Micah, if you happen to be reading this years from now...).
While 3, (now 4: see pending blog post), children do make for busy days, and evenings, and sometimes nights, and allows scarce opportunity for sitting down at the computer to type without small fingers "helping" on the keyboard, I'm not actually sure that busyness is the reason I rarely update the blog. After all, I could give up a little of my facebook voyeurism. I think there's the possibility that I seldom post because I don't have anything to say - at least nothing as witty, entertaining, or brilliant as I would like it to be.
Kind of a sad thought. I'm hoping this too shall pass. And in the meantime, my uninspired self is thoroughly enjoying the laughter, peace, and real joy that comes with this season of my life.
Both of you who are reading this blog will have to endure the mediocrity of the posts. Don't worry, it's only 5 1/2 years until Micah (you'll meet him in a few minutes) goes off to kindergarten.

Josiah at One

This year has gone by really quickly for us but has undoubtedly been the longest year of Josiah's life :).

It does seem like yesterday that we welcomed Josiah John into our lives but he's experienced quite a bit in 12 months. Since last September, Josiah's taken two long (but fun) family car trips to Texas and back, he's camped in a tent and a cabin, stuck his toes in the Atlantic Ocean and "swam" in rivers, lakes, and pools, flown to Phoenix, and figured out how to roll over, sit up, pull-up, drink from a bottle, crawl, wave, clap, rock on his horse, get our attention, express his dislike, laugh out loud, and smile smile smile. He's gained 12 pounds and grown a lot taller, has 8 teeth and great head of white-blond hair, just long enough to be shaggy around his ears and curl a (very) little in the back. He's a really sweet and very friendly baby with the most open and happy smile for everyone he meets. For each child, and with each child, the family context and parental attention changes some, and we have been blessed that Josiah is pretty independent and easy going, but demanding enough to get our attention and hold his own with his siblings. It's been fun, especially in recent months, to see his unique personality develop.

Josiah doesn't really like:

• sleeping - he's gotten better and makes it through most nights without our assitance, but never without a couple almost awake fusses. He's gotten to be a good, regular, two-nap-a- day kid, though.


• being alone - he's never real happy about being left in a room to play on his own - though he does play pretty well on his own if he can see you nearby (sadly, he is rarely left alone by his brother and sister...)


• too much attention from his siblings - Asher especially, but also Serena, often get carried away in their affection and "playing" with Josiah. Countless times a day I'll hear an angry squawk and not even need to investigate before I say, "Asher, leave your brother alone!" Having said this... he does love his big brother and sister - see the next list


• fruit - with the exception of bananas all the time and a few other fruits on occasion, unlike his brother and sister, he prefers his carbs


• the tiger mask - cries in real fear when Asher approaches wearing it (this does not keep Asher from doing so)


• swimming - we thought he did at first, but that pretty much wore off over the summer


• climbing the stairs - he can and does do it, but fusses the whole time

Josiah loves:

• human interaction - he really loves to be talked to, smiled at, played with and rewards you (or any random stranger) with a huge grin


• bouncing on the trampoline (sitting down) and rocking on the horse


• chewing on crayons


• pulling tissues out of the box


• balloons on strings


• the motorized/talking Lightening McQueen car


• tomato sauces- on pizza, pasta, etc


• his pacifiers - a must-have for sleeping that we're going to start limiting to the bed


• music - he really seems to enjoy it, claps along, bounces some


• crawling -all my kids do, they're in no hurry to walk anywhere

Some unique Josiah things:

• twirls/waves his hands when he wants something or is excited about something- sometimes very insistently


• has started "hugging" by laying his head briefly against your shoulder when you pick him up


• rubs his eyes often and pretty vigorously, particularly when he's sleepy


• prone to respitory crud, seems to get a cold easily


• doesn't laugh out loud a ton, but will really get going if you tickle his thighs or his chest


• is a great growler - What does a lion say? Raugghh What does a tiger say? Raugghh What does a cow say? Raugghh (we're still working on this)


• Waits until the right beat to clap on "If you're happy and you know it"


• says/ has said dada and mama and maybe nana and definitely "dis" (this), but not really consistently or often and in respones to prompting but not with evidence of meaning for him - he doesn't talk a whole bunch, which isn't surprising given the two older chatterboxes around all the time (although Serena swears he said "funky" the other day


• Josiah still has "crazy toes" - they're really long and flexible, often, when relaxed, he'll be "pointing" with his big toe


• he's a pretty busy guy with a mischievous glint in his eye. I'll admit I'm a little bit nervous about the "trouble" year 2 could bring :)

All in all, long year or short, we feel blessed to have Josiah in our family and look forward to watching him grow and change.

Oh yeah! One last thing...

For anybody reading out there who hasn't heard, read on facebook, or seen me in the last few weeks:

We're having a baby in December!

He/She is due on Christmas Eve, to be exact. And I'll even save you the trouble of doing some math - Josiah will be 15 months old, Asher will be 3 3/4, and Serena will be 5 1/2.
The timing's a bit of a surprise (I was having my babies in even numbered years), but with the 3 wonderful, beloved children we are enjoying so much, how can we feel anything but blessed?(even when we occasionally also feel overwhelmed, crazy, unsure...)
We won't find out again whether it's a boy or girl until s/he's born - so there's that surprise to look forward to!

Serena's Big Week

Serena had a big week this week! She started Kindergarten at Southside Elementary School. She goes every day, all day (8:00 - 2:40), which is taking some getting used to. She seems to enjoy it while she's there, but in the morning's she'd kind of rather stay home and play. She has an excellent, teacher, Mrs. Taylor, and already knew a number of kids in her class from church and preschool. She makes us proud and it's so fun to hear about the things she does and learns at school - she's not real forthcoming, but gradually the stories come out :).

Serena also began ballet lessons this week. After agonizing over the choice between ballet, soccer, and piano, she chose ballet (which i kind of guessed she'd choose all along). She goes to class on Monday nights and had a good first class. At the end she told me, "The dancing was fun, but the music was boring." It will be fun to see whether she comes to enjoy dance as much as I did, or finds her niche somewhere else. In the meantime, she sure is beautiful in her dance clothes.

Of course, all the adjusting has made a big week for us parents as well - we've got to get up and moving earlier each morning (which we kind of like) and remember to pick her up every day too! Plus, the establishment of a schedule for Serena means that her things are truly beginning to take priority over our things/schedule/plans. Gone are the days of toting our kids along to whatever we have going on. Asher's having to get used to not having is number one playmate around as well, and he's done pretty well adjusting (he doesn't ask if it's time to pick her up more than 4-5 times per day). I've enjoyed getting to have a little more one-on-one time with him. And Josiah... well, he's smiley as always and mostly just gets toted around still.

a GREAT Summer

I'd be remiss if I didn't mention (briefly and belatedly) what great summer we had. It started off at the beginning of June with Joshua's ordination, which occasioned visits from both sets of grandparents (parents) and our good friend Josh Hubert. We also baptized Josiah the same weekend!

June was mostly filled with summer stuff - swimming, playing in the yard, riding bikes, playgrounds, and popsicles. Joshua began working full time and I backed off to working half-time, and both of us have enjoyed the different pace. Both Serena and Asher got to participate in Vacation Bible School (as did mom and dad!). And Serena had a fun "mermaid" swim party for her 5th birthday. (On a side note, yes, it's hard to believe we've been blessed by our sweet Serena for FIVE years!) Joshua also spent 10 days in Peru with the church mission team. I was flying solo with the kids on July 4th, but we had a great time at a small-town parade and festival, a wave pool, and wonderful fireworks show.

And for almost all of July (2 1/2 weeks) we were on vacation to Texas and Arkansas. We drove over 2600 miles for back-to-back family reunions! First, my family met up in central Texas (lake LBJ) for a week. Mom and Dad, our 5, Elisa, Stephen, Ava, Corbin, and Sienna, and Paul and Veronica and Dillon, and my grandparents (the "great" grandparents) all gathered for a WONDERFUL time. It was as crazy at times (as you might imagine it would be with 17 people, 7 of whom are 5 years ols and younger), but mostly it was pretty relaxing and good to be together. The only low point of the week was at the very beginning, when Josiah had to ahve emergency hernia surgery at the children's hosptial in Austin, but he received great care and sailed right through! Altogether, the whole episode lasted about 30 hours.

The second week of our vacation was spent in the Ozark Mountains in Arkansas with Joshua's family - his parents, the five of us, Jodi, Ruben, Tomas, Isaac and Alison, Jacob, Jonah and Lydia (and 4 members of Lydia's family for part of the time). Yep - that's another week with 15 people. Again, we had a great time - relaxing, eating, playing games, eating, swimming in the river, and eating. We feel so blessed by our families and the opportunity we had to spend some time with them this summer. The distance and rarity make it so special - and the kids really enjoyed the time with their cousins.

The travel days as a family were good - really. We spent a lot of time in the car, but also stopped to play and picnic and, of course, swim in the hotel pools. The kids were champion travelers. They read books, played games, watched movies, played with toys, colored, and ate snacks all the way across 10 different states. And the minivan with 160,000 miles on it deserves a big thank you for a perfect trip! All of this has just encouraged us to do it again sometime....

We had just 2 weeks in August once we got back before school started, so we swam as much as possible, spent time with friends, and enjoyed some good lazy days. Serena and Asher have a wonderful time playing together, this summer had made Serena an incredible swimmer (and Asher much more comfortable in the water), and Josiah's gotten the hang of crawling everywhere and getting into things. So, I guess it's been time well-spent. It's definitely been a lot of fun!

Do you call them fireflies or lightning bugs?

rising up out of the summertime grass
with that tempting, erratic flash,
they drifted like the firecracker haze
in the heavy evening air

up past their bedtime, they hunted,
neon-orange net in hand,
but frustration flickered fast
until mama tupperwared two

to serve as nightlight
on the dresser in the dark