A New Year's Announcement

As we approached the New Year, I pondered what 2013 would bring. We got our answer the day after Christmas. A new baby!

 

Suddenly I have something to look forward to. Since Tyler died, it has felt like we were going through the motions, but not moving forward. It was hard to have much to look forward to, and all we were doing was looking back. I finally have something to be excited about, and for once instead of dreading another passing year, I am curious what the next year will look like. There are some weird things, this is Baby #4, because Gabriel will always be my #3, so we can't re-order them. That would be too weird. I used to think it was weird that moms did that. Now I totally get it. I'm starting to have more peaceful days. I can look back at his baby pics and just smile. He was so adorable. The more recent happy pics bother me a lot more, but baby pics are the past no matter what. If that makes any sense.

We have a tradition of sharing the news using the Big Brother shirt. I apparently didn't get a pic of Dawson in the shirt, but here is Tyler wearing it, Aug 2010. Dawson was a year old when we spread the news on the 4th of July, Tyler was 15 months, we told people at our family reunion and Gabriel was 22 months and we used New Years. Tyler looks so little here! Our age gaps are getting bigger, from 18 months, to 25 months, and now 30 months. Though we have kept our year pattern, 07, 09, 11, 13.

Dawson has really gotten into his pacman obsession lately. His chicken nuggets, cookies and all things round need to be made into pacman shapes. One of his therapists made a whole set of pacmans, along with the ghosts so he can play with them. He's really been enjoying that. This is a pacman cookie that he cut himself.

 Gabriel was quite excited that we replaced the tree with a cube slide. We always take it out after Christmas every year so the kids can use up some of that energy they have from being cooped up.

 Dawson is getting a bit big, but he's still enjoying it too.

 Sleepy babies are so cute. He got so big though!

 

Seems like it wasn't long ago that Gabriel was sleeping in the boppy, all scrunched up and just a few days old.

 

 Dawson has the weirdest sleeping positions. I moved him to his bed and he straightened out, but when I woke him up in the morning, he was sleeping like this again! He looks so peaceful when he's sleeping. It's good to remember this face, especially on those long crazy days.

Dan went back to work on the 7th, so it's nice to be getting paychecks again, after having 4 weeks off. He's been liking his job and even got the "Outstanding Quality" award at the company Christmas party. We've been having some pretty cold weather, so it's nice that both his job and Dawson's school are fairly close to home. Dawson goes back to school tomorrow and has a longer bus ride in the morning, around 30-40 minutes, so hopefully he will keep his gloves and things on and stay warm.

Today we got to use Dawson's new handicapp parking tag. I recently learned that Autistic kids and adults can get them, since they have absolutely no danger awareness. This puts them at risk of accidental death. I can't even begin to say how many times I've had to pull him away from moving vehicles that he wanders in front of. I've had nightmares about it, and it's one of my biggest safety concerns with him. His therapists and I have been working on it, and his behavior is getting a bit better, but the danger awareness is still not there. He doesn't understand why we have to do it, so he doesn't care. I figured it would get easier as he got older and hopefully more aware, but it's just not happening. I was even feeling weird about asking his Dr, but he jumped right on it and said it was a great idea. He's seen it himself, so I was relieved that he thought it was a good idea. So now we don't have to worry about parking far away, crossing aisles of moving cars and other dangers. Even if he's holding our hand, he tends to suddenly take his hand back, and he will do it fast, often side stepping into traffic. It's really a big relief, especially since he's getting bigger and faster.

I have my first OB appointment on the 30th. I'm 7 weeks along today and so far feeling exhausted. I've been getting some morning sickness too, the foods I'm tolerating seem to be getting less, so I'm not too excited about that. I have to eat something or I feel sick, but I can't eat certain things or I feel sick. So far I have a couple things that always work, so I've been living on apples, crackers and lifesavers. Just trying to keep something in my stomach all the time, it helps. Hoping it won't last too long, it seems to be a little worse each day this week. Thankfully Gabriel has been pretty good to just play during the day so I can rest. Sometimes he even comes and cuddles up with me. :)