Wednesday, December 18, 2013

Wiley Meets Santa Clause


We took Wiley to meet Santa at Brookwood Mall here in Birmingham. Honestly, I'm pretty sure he's the same Santa that's been around this area since I was a child, which is neat. I loved the photos we got, I'm just sad because I didn't realize if we didn't buy all the photos then we'd lose all but the photos we actually bought prints of (I thought I could go look at an online gallery and purchase them later). Still, I'm very happy with them. I just wish we'd bought white and red striped pants for Wiley, we were (are) strapped for cash so even doing the Santa photos was pushing it.

The girl whose job it was to get Wiley to smile for photos kept saying "You're too easy!" because he's such a happy, smiley boy she barely had to even try. Afterward when we were buying the photos Santa held Wiles for us and one of the girls told us "Oh, Santa has fallen in love with your baby" because he was enjoying him so much.

I'm hoping and praying that next year Wiley will still be just as smiley and happy about seeing Santa as he was this year, but I guess we'll just have to wait and see. It's not like a crying photo is the end of the world, I just like having happy photos.



Monday, December 16, 2013

Long Time No See

So I've been pretty awful at the whole blogging thing. I meant to stick with it, but in October I was getting so stressed out trying to make myself keep updating during the times Wiley would be asleep, and that wasn't a whole lot of time--at least not all at once.

Since then his sleep pattern has changed a bit, though we'll see how long he stays asleep this time. I've also adjusted a bit better. Mostly, while I want to be a serious blogger, I'm going to remind myself that Wiles is my first priority and I should never stress myself out trying to finish typing a post or anything when he's being fussy because he wants to be held or something.

So what's he been doing since mid-October? He's pretty much gotten smiling mastered and is now melting the hearts of people everywhere with his wonderful smile.

This past week he has just started rolling over onto his side by himself, I almost feel bad because I barely noticed it. Patrick was the one who actually realized he'd witnessed an accomplishment and got excited about it.


He's also started that wonderful drooling phase, though right now it's in the cute little mouth-bubble stage. I guess I should be excited it means teeth are in his near future, but I was kinda hoping he'd skip that drooly stage. I am not the best mom when it comes to saliva, boogers and whatnot. Obviously he's much more interested in eating his fingers (or attempting to eat his whole hand) now.


We also were involved in a car accident this past week. It was very scary, but it honestly wasn't that bad of a wreck. It took us a day to even find anything we actually considered damage on our car (on the back, left hand side of the bumper there's some that wasn't there before). We'd been stopped at a light and a girl rear-ended us when (as she told Patrick) she looked down to navigate on her cell phone and when she looked back up a few seconds later it was too late and she hit us. We'd just been walking at Railroad Park with one of my best friends. Patrick was driving and I'd let my friend take the front-seat while I sat in the back with Wiley and held Lupe (we have a harness for her but we need to clean out the car so the spot we were sitting in was the only part of the seat somebody could sit in (especially since we put Wile's seat in the center to be safe). Wiley had just fallen asleep when she rear-ended us and he started crying. I freaked out and got him out immediately, jumping out of the car and trying to get out of the middle of the busy road we were in to get to the sidewalk in front of one of the several hospitals downtown. I yelled for Patrick to get Lupe over when he could as I didn't want somebody else to hit our cars with Wiley or Lupe in it but it took a bit for him to get her over there. Wiley wouldn't stop crying for about a minute, which was terrifying to me because it was the longest he'd gone without calming down when I was there to comfort him. The good news is, our car was still driveable, other than being understandably sore none of us were worse for wear and the accident was so minor it fit all the qualifications required for our car seat company, Britax, to say that the seat was still use-able (we'd actually gotten my mom's seat from her car to use, which is a Baby Trend, but I feel like the Britax is much safer). We checked over the seat a lot just to be safe, of course. And Wiley got checked out at the emergency room just to be safe, of course he was fine and smiled all through the doctor's examination of him. I almost hate that I took him just because there were sick kids coughing in the hospital, but hopefully he didn't catch anything (he shows no signs yet).
(These two photos were taken at the park about 20 minutes before the accident)

He did scare me at the hospital because during our almost 2 hour wait (I knew it'd take awhile as he wasn't obviously injured so not an urgent need patient) he kept crying and not always for obvious reasons. Sure, we got dropped off at the wrong part of the building and I had to borrow a Radio Flyer wagon to cart him from one side to the other (of a large hospital), the wagon also made awful ring-wraith noises, especially when turned or pushed backward (like when I had to push it out of two elevators). The wraith noises, understandably upset him. But even just sitting there he'd get randomly startled, which I can understand after he'd been peacefully asleep then the chaos of a wreck. At one point after Patrick got there (he drove Lupe and my friend to meet my mom nearby and she took my friend home and Lupe to her house so he could come back to the emergency room with us) we wound up with Wiley trying to cry while we sang You Are My Sunshine at him. It was so dramatic, it was adorable.
(at the emergency room)
Let's see, what else? I think Wiles is about to wake so I'll try to sum up the big holidays that I didn't bother posting around quickly.

Halloween was really un-eventful for us this year. We went to the church's festival, but since Wiley was two months at the time it was a bit lost on him. It was neat that this couple in our small group whose son is a bit younger than Wiley (they were actually due within a week of one-another initially but since Wiley was born at about 38 weeks by his original due-date (39 by the second one they gave us and I delayed the surgery 'til as late as possible during the week to get him as close to 39/40 I could) and their boy was born a bit closer to his actual due-date he's half a month younger). Anyway, Wiley went as Batman and their son went as Robin (his dad went as Batman). Lupe actually went as Batgirl (I wanted her to go as Robin but the Robin costumes were sold out in her size). Still, I thought they were super-cute as Batman and Robin (I wish I'd gotten a photo!), their little boy is also much smaller than Wiley (I think the other boy was somewhere in the 6lb range at birth) so it worked perfectly.

For Thanksgiving we went over to one of my friend's parents house to spend time with her and her daughter and another friend and her daughter. These two girls are two of my best friends and we've been friends since elementary school. 

Mommy and Wiley. He's my mini-me!

Me and Patrick. I almost had forgotten I can look presentable, haha!

After that we went to Patrick's mom's house, but I don't think I really have photos from that. Somebody got photos, I haven't seen them.

I guess I'll try to make separate posts about some of the other goings-on, like the monthly photos I take as well as Santa pics and just random pics I love. I think it's going to be much easier for me, especially once I catch up. I just hope I can because I have some seriously precious photos I need to find a reason (and the time) to post.